Drama > Almodovar, Pedro Drama

Bad Education

Advantages: Amazing storyline
Disadvantages: in Spanish with subtitles (although that is an upside to some)

This is an amazing film, maybe one of the best by the great director Pedro Almodovar. Gael Garcia Bernal's performance is outstanding. The film is funny yet dark and takes you on a great cinematic journey. The story is amazing and you will not be satisfied until you see the end. Although the film deals with many serious issues such as drugs and child abuse, Almodovar is able to being comedy to the whole recipe. The film is in the original Spanish ...

Cristina.M 06.05.2008 · Read full review
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Review of Bad Education (DVD)

Almodovar's Most Complete Collection

Advantages: Witty and Insightful Drama
Disadvantages: Certainly not for subtitle-o-phobes!

...includes recent work such as Bad Education. Pedro Almodovar's work is mainly in Spanish, and although well subtitled, is very fast-moving and would not be suitable for non-Spanish speakers who dislike or are unaccustomed to subtitles. His subject matter is often very challenging, and would not be suitable for those who are uncomfortable with themes exploring gender, sexual relations, the psychology of violence, suppression or sex, or questioning ...
...comfortable with exploring these difficult themes, Almodovar offers a casket of wonders, with his witty and insightful blend of drama: juxtaposing the fantastical with the vulgar. He keenly picks apart the complicated psyche of those who become social outcasts, and unabashedly offers backgrounds which demonstrate the almost linear qualities of his character development. This collection of films is a brilliant, inventive and moving exploration of ...

loobylane 14.02.2006 · Read full review
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Review of Bad Education / Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down / Live Flesh / All About My Mother / Talk To Her (Almodovar Box Set) (DVD)

Get Knotted

Advantages: A quirky film with oddly lovely performances
Disadvantages: Loses cohesion through the multiplicity of ideas

...of his earlier films, including Tie me Up! Tie me Down! Antonio Banderas plays a mental patient, Ricky, released into the community. A playful young man, he larks about on the set of a horror film, indulging in minor thefts, air guitar and handstands, before kidnapping the lead actress, Marina, and tying her up in her own flat 'until she falls in love'. It's quite hard to make a sweet comedy out of a film where the lead actor headbutts the love ...
...participants are still miserable. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! isn't my favourite Almodovar, you'd have to look at Bad Education, All About My Mother, Volver or Talk to Her for that. But it repeats one of the director's hallmarks of presenting an incredibly mismatched large cast of characters, all of whom we eventually come to care about. The riot of ideas presented means the film does lose a bit of cohesion, unlike some of the director's more recent ...

Olly_Plimsoll 26.02.2009 · Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (DVD)

Nuns on drugs

Advantages: Amusing, quirky, obviously Almodovar
Disadvantages: Some may be offended by the portrayal of the Church

When singer Yolanda's boyfriend dies of a drug overdose after she supplied the drugs, she hopes to keep her head down. No such luck; it is soon clear that she is involved and the police come looking for her. Deciding to follow up a contact at a convent, she is taken in and soon becomes accustomed to the life there. Surprisingly, although the nuns obviously have faith and follow it, they also like the occasional injection of heroin, and, it is suggested, ...
...hobbies. However, the convent is in danger of shutting down. What will happen to its inhabitants? And will Yolanda manage to keep out of harm's way? Anyone who has seen an Almodovar film will know that they rarely make sense, are often sacrilegious, and are filled with quirky happenings that give the viewer no choice but to laugh. They also concentrate on women and the stories are certainly told from their point of view. This film, although it is ...

sunmeilan 13.12.2008 · Read full review
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Review of Dark Habits (DVD)

Almodovarian madness

Advantages: Totally bonkers, but in a good way
Disadvantages: Not for those who like a film to make obvious sense

...thinking, 'what?!?' That is exactly what I thought when I first started watching the film. However, having already seen another film directed by Pedro Almodovar, Volver, I knew enough to keep watching. And although the film continues along the same mad vein, it is strangely watchable and very very entertaining. And even though it was made back in 1985 and is full of very dodgy clothes and wallpaper, it doesn't seem at all dated. Gloria is played ...
...we are - this is what the film is about, but again, it isn't really addressed. The whole film is like a mad soap opera, such as Eastenders, where everyone is in and out of everyone else's house, there is no privacy, and everyone's lives are intertwined with everyone else's. I have read that the point Almodovar was trying to make is that this is the state of the working class, always trying to make ends meet and never getting any privacy. I personally ...

sunmeilan 28.03.2008 · Read full review
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Review of What Have I Done To Deserve This? (DVD)