All About My Mother

So, last night I watched a movie. That’s right! I did something leisurely and enjoyable during finals week. Hate me, don’t ya? Who has time for that you ask? No one, and certainly I am no exception but sometimes…I just wanna do what I wanna do. Feel me?

I digress, last night I watched a movie called All About My Mother or Todo Sobre Mi Madre if you’re feeling Spanish. It’s a film directed by a famous Spanish director named Pedro Almodóvar. So here’s the basic plot rundown: woman witnesses her son’s accidental death, reexamines her life and decides to go to Barcelona to find her ex-husband and tell him about the loss of the son he never knew he had. Along the way, she reunites with an old friend (a pre-op transsexual prostitute) and creates a bond with an HIV-positive pregnant nun (who happens to be played by Penelope Cruz = big plus!). We later find out that her husband is transgender.

Here’s the trailer if you’re interested:

Now while this may sound like a bizarre scenario destined to be filled with stereotypes, the plot is played in such a tragic, hilarious and whimsical way so free of stereotype and prejudice that it can only be an Almodóvar film. Okay, so I’m a little biased because of my obsession with his films and Spanish culture, but trust me I know some of you have seen his films and know what I am talking about.

But what I really want to get at is what Almodóvar’s films are really about. In every film that he creates and directs he glorifies the power of sisterhood, female solidarity, and questions gender roles and sexuality. He has been quoted saying that “I get much more inspiration from women, I’ve always liked the feminine sensibility and find it much easier to create female characters … Women have more facets, they seem to me to be more interesting protagonists.” This is interesting in contrast to most successful Hollywood films. In Allan Johnson’s book The Gender Knot, he addresses the fact that of the last forty films that won the Oscar for Best Picture since 1965, only four of them tell a story through the life of a female character. Two of the four were musicals (The Sound of Music and Chicago).

That’s not to say that Almodóvar’s films are not respected in Hollywood. In 1999, All About My Mother won the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film and was described as a “compassionate tribute to women.” It’s exciting that his movies have transcended the “inner-circle” of Hollywood traditions that tend to reward the stereotyping of women and create secondary roles for them in relation to men. When Thelma and Louise came out, there was an uproar about women behaving in “unfeminine” ways, toting guns around and “acting masculine. ” The same goes for movies such as Beaches and Passion Fish. These movies were scrutinized for “copying” the relationships between men in male-centered films, while the female bond was regarded as illegitimate and even startling.

If you’re interested in any of Almodóvar’s films I would suggest watching All About My Mother, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, which addresses relationships between women and men, Volver, which examines domestic and sexual abuse, motherhood and female solidarity, A Bad Education which examines religion, sexual abuse, LGBT issues and drug abuse and What Have I Done to Deserve This?, which addresses motherhood, isolation, marriage and gender roles.