Departing more and more from his more usual farcical style while retaining many of the elements that have made him the kind of storyteller he is today, Pedro Almodovar ended the year 2000 with a striking, passionate film that unless you had a rock for a heart you would never grasp its ultimate, compassionate essence.
Manuela (Cecilia Roth) is at the center of this story, and through her unimaginable tragedy -- her son Esteban (Eloy Azorin) is killed in a freak accident while trying to get the autograph of his favorite theatre actress, Huma Rojo (played with great dignity by Spanish legend Marisa Paredes) -- she is able to reassemble the pieces of her life even though the people she encounters within her future bring her right back to her past.
Almodovar films this in a completely non-exploitative way though there may be times when it feels as though it is, but being a Spanish film maker, I can see and appreciate where the growing passion reflected in many of its emotional scenes is coming from. The tragedies of these women, and of one of the more gender-confused men, all lead to that last gesture of maternal compassion, and the fact that Manuela decides to let her ex-lover Esteban, now a trans-gendered female, learn that not only did he have a son who died and loved him blindly but has another infant son borne from a nun (Penelope Cruz) is the core of what human relations are about: love which transcends errors, sex, character, even the absence of a father. A fascinating movie experience that resonates and brings the real Almodovar into the spotlight.
Manuela (Cecilia Roth) is at the center of this story, and through her unimaginable tragedy -- her son Esteban (Eloy Azorin) is killed in a freak accident while trying to get the autograph of his favorite theatre actress, Huma Rojo (played with great dignity by Spanish legend Marisa Paredes) -- she is able to reassemble the pieces of her life even though the people she encounters within her future bring her right back to her past.
Almodovar films this in a completely non-exploitative way though there may be times when it feels as though it is, but being a Spanish film maker, I can see and appreciate where the growing passion reflected in many of its emotional scenes is coming from. The tragedies of these women, and of one of the more gender-confused men, all lead to that last gesture of maternal compassion, and the fact that Manuela decides to let her ex-lover Esteban, now a trans-gendered female, learn that not only did he have a son who died and loved him blindly but has another infant son borne from a nun (Penelope Cruz) is the core of what human relations are about: love which transcends errors, sex, character, even the absence of a father. A fascinating movie experience that resonates and brings the real Almodovar into the spotlight.