• The visual style is, as always with Almodóvar, about the mise-en-scene filled with vibrant colors, costume design. There are at least 4-5 jaw-droppers here that may end up pushing this film even higher up in appreciation upon a repeat viewing. I’ve done the best I can to find them and these are all museum art-on-wall shots and compositions
like the great auteurs who previously worked in melodrama- Fassbinder and Sirk– Almodovar pays as much attention to the background as he does the foreground
gob-smackingly beautiful– painterly
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a quick sequence during a dialogue scene– magnificently obstructed and textured mise-en-scene
  • Almodovar works in melodrama- one of the all-time greats—like Fassbinder and Sirk—but the autofiction (his word in the film) here pushes this more towards Fellini (critics have mentioned that this is his 8 ½ and that’ an apt description). Some of Almodóvar earlier works have been broader almost Preston Sturges-like comedies (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!) and others have leaned towards Hitchcock (The Skin I Live In, Talk to Her)
  • A triumph for Antonio Banderas—the best performance of his career
  • Memory and flashbacks – and then conversations with other works of art, artists and texts (including his own which is a sort of bizarre pat on the back)
  • The opening credits are stunning. Almodóvar is one of the few still taking this seriously- it’s another nod to Hitchcock.
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The opening credits are stunning. Almodóvar is one of the few still taking this seriously- it’s another nod to Hitchcock
  • A fabulous reoccurring image in his oeuvre—the two people in conversation in chairs (wheelchairs in Talk to Her)—really well done. His films are highly verbal so to make a composition out of a dialogue sequence is impressive. Bergman could do it but few others.
A fabulous reoccurring image in his oeuvre—the two people in conversation in chairs (wheelchairs in Talk to Her)—really well done. His films are highly verbal so to make a composition out of a dialogue sequence is impressive. Bergman could do it but few others.
  • The final shot is breathtaking as well- it’s metafiction (it collides the world of the main narrative and flashbacks) but also a strong composition with the brown tile work
The final shot is breathtaking as well- it’s metafiction (it collides the world of the main narrative and flashbacks) but also a strong composition with the brown tile work
  • Highly Recommend border after one viewing. Right on the cusp of a top 10 of the year-worthy film and another strong entry for Almodóvar