Javier is hot. Luisita is fat. Somehow, beyond everyone’s wildest imaginations, Javier (Carlos Enrique Almirante) falls for Luisita (Liety Chaviano). She can’t believe it’s true—most guys seem to be more interested in her enviable flat—and when she discovers Javier lied to her about certain details, she takes strangely drastic measures. The end. OK, Madrigal is much more complicated than that, but it’s around that flimsy premise that Fernando Pérez tries to wrap an exceedingly mysterious story. Javier is first intrigued by Luisita when, as the sole audience member for a play in which Javier plays a nun (and includes a madrigal), she leaves the theater mid-performance. Dramatic conversations ensue, often in the rain, about their secrets and their stories: Luisita won’t tolerate lies; her obsessive dream in life is to own a harp; Javier is writing a story. But, really, who cares? While the characters have plenty of quirky touches—she works in a morgue, he’s often wearing a habit—there’s nothing to make you care about their fates. Pérez, who also co-wrote the script, pays great attention to symbolic threads throughout the film, and the scenery is beautiful, in a depraved-Cuba kind of way. But by the last half hour, when the story switches to Javier’s short science-fiction story—which may just be an excuse to show orgies—you’ll want to get on the boat, significantly named Barcelona, even more than the characters do.