Princesas (2006)

Image credit: Princesas: Teresa Isasi

NOT HOOKER HEAVEN Micaela Nevárez is one of the problematic prostitutes at the center of Princesas

Spanish director Fernando León de Aranoa made a tiny splash in 2002, when his Javier Bardem drama Mondays in the Sun beat out Pedro Almodóvar's Talk to Her as Spain's official entry for the Oscars. He returns with Princesas, an ambling tale of two Madrid hookers-with-hearts-of-gold (one wants implants, the other misses her kid). The way that Aranoa so clearly venerates his lively women feels Almodóvar-esque, but the movie aims most of all to suggest that hookerdom is hell — and it's neither realistic nor unsentimental enough to pull that off.