Bill Condon’s 2025 musical film “Kiss of the Spider Woman”, which went straight to streaming in South Korea, is about two very different but equally desperate prisoners whose reality swings back and forth between desperation and fantasy. As they begin to open themselves more to each other along the story, they also come to hold more onto their shared fantasy, which eventually leads them to sort of salvation for both of them.

Like recent musical film “The Color Purple” (2023), the movie has a rather complicated background history. It is based on John Kander and Fred Ebb’s acclaimed Broadway musical of the same name, which is based on the novel of the same name by Argentine writer Manuel Puig. Incidentally, Puig’s novel was already adapted into Brazilian filmmaker Héctor Babenco’s 1985 film of the same name, which won a Best Actor Oscar for William Hurt besides being nominated for Best Picture and Best Director Oscar (Sidenote: It was the same year when “The Color Purple” (1985), which is the predecessor to the 2023 film, came out and then garnered 11 Oscar nominations).

I am not so familiar with Kander and Ebb’s Broadway musical (I only watched “Chicago” (2002), by the way), but I can tell you instead that director/writer Bill Condon, who wrote the adapted screenplay for “Chicago”, makes a fairly solid musical film. Like “Chicago”, the movie frequently alternates between reality and fantasy, and this can be a bit distracting at times, but it mostly succeeds in holding our attention thanks to Condon’s competent direction and the strong performances from its three lead performers.

At the beginning, the movie, which is set in Argentina, 1983, introduces us to Luis Molina (Tonatiuh), a young gay window dresser who got convicted due to his homosexuality and has spent several years in some big prison. We see him being sent to a section mainly for political dissidents, and we soon meet his new cellmate Valentín Arregui Paz (Diego Luna), who does not welcome Luis much right from their first encounter just because of his homosexuality.

However, mainly because there is nothing else he can do as tediously waiting for whatever may happen to him next during his seemingly endless incarceration, Valentín gradually befriends Luis as time goes by, and Luis gladly talks a lot about not only himself but also his favorite movie. It is some old musical film he often watched when he was young, and he is a huge fan of its beautiful lead actress Ingrid Luna (Jennifer Lopez). As your typical romantic, he sees a lot of himself from the heroine played by Luna, and he certainly describes her romantic musical drama with considerable enthusiasm.

As a guy far less apolitical than Luis, Valentín cannot help but become sarcastic or critical about the movie, but, what do you know, he slowly finds himself more engaged in Luis’s vivid description of that old musical film. In fact, he and Luis soon become the two male characters surrounding Luna’s heroine, and their shared fantasy brings some levity to their grim life condition at present.

Nevertheless, they are also often reminded of how things can be cruel and harsh to them in prison. Valentín must be always careful for his possible survival, and he still cannot open himself fully to Luis because that can endanger not only himself but also Luis. In case of Luis, it turns out early in the story that he was forced to become an informer by the prison warden, and the situation certainly becomes all the trickier for him as he finds himself more attached to Valentín in addition to getting to know him more. 

While their despair and anxiety are increased more and more, both Luis and Valentín are more absorbed in Luis’s movie story, and the movie serves us several nice musical scenes as expected. While making a striking contrast with the two heroes’ gloomy reality, the musical scenes in the film come to resonate more with their complex relationship drama, and there is some real poignancy from when both of them make each own important choice during the last act.

The two lead actors are certainly crucial for the emotional ground of the film. As Diego Luna steadily holds the ground as required, Tonatiuh, a newcomer who previously played a substantial supporting characters in “Carry-On” (2024), goes up and down along his character’s dramatic arc as demanded, and his natural chemistry with his co-star is one of the reasons why the movie works well in both of its reality and fantasy parts. They smoothly slip into the musical scenes in the film whenever that is necessary, and they and Jennifer Lopez, who incidentally gives her best performance since her commanding supporting turn in “Hustlers” (2019) here in this film, are compelling as their musical movie characters come to form a complex triangle among them. While Lopez surely has a couple of showstopper moments as exuding her undeniable star quality, Luna and Tonatiuh also have each own moment to shine, and Tonatiuh is quite terrific as his character delivers the grand finale of the story. 

On the whole, “Kiss of the Spider Woman” does not reach the achievement level of its 1985 predecessor, but it is engaging for several good musical moments to be savored as well as the commendable efforts from its three lead performers. I admire it rather than being enthusiastic about it, but I had a fair share of entertainment and poignancy, and I guess that is enough for recommendation.