All About My Mother

“All About My Mother” film review, The Daily Cardinal, 1999

There seems to be a presumption among critics and journalists that maturity is inherently the companion of artistic virtue. That debatable axiom seems to have influenced film critics paying deference to Pedro Almodovar, the flamboyant Spanish director, and his 13th feature, All About My Mother.

A perceptible change has been detected – a “maturity” one could say – in Almodovar’s recent films, beginning with The Flower of My Secret (1995) and continuing with Live Flesh (1997). All About My Mother is purported to be the fulfillment of this maturity, an unlucky distinction for any film.

Possibly more ominous is the much-reported stamp of Hollywood approval that Almodovar has received. There’s even a rumor that All About My Mother will be remade as an American film. It’s not surprising: but for the language (Spanish) and the settings (Spain), All About Mother often feels like an American film. The most obvious connection is the film’s preoccupations with Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire and the 1950 film All About Eve.

There is likewise a contrived narrative symmetry and painful dialogue (“She’s hooked on junk, but I’m hooked on her.”).

Another bond the film has with American audiences, especially viewers of daytime talk shows, is its supply of eccentric characters, epitomized by a pregnant nun with AIDS (Penelope Cruz). Unfortunately, the mature Almodovar cleanses these characters so completely and appears so intent on avoiding “camp” that what remains is mild and unconvincing.

Still, there is a certain depth of emotion to the film, embodied vividly by Manuela (Cecilia Roth), a woman whose son is killed. And the director’s eye for composition and color is clear.

But the overarching sentimentality and mawkish implausibility of the story (flaws shared by two other European films which recently found large American audiences, Il Postino and Life is Beautiful) compromise the film’s dramatic impact, something to which Almodovar is clearly aspiring.