Arguably the greatest champion of women in cinematic history, Pedro Almodóvar decided to tell a man’s story this time around. His own. And honestly, I prefer when he was drawing from the woman’s perspective… and from fiction.
Salvador Mallo (Antonio Banderas) is film director in pain. His various maladies -including ugly spinal surgery combined with personal depression- have left him without much of a life. For the most part, he’s a shut-in recluse. If he had any ambition left, it would have dissolved in his trough of daily meds.
Unfortunately, when you’ve been a successful director, people need you to be places. Don’t we all know that one, Pedro? Salvo has been asked to make a public appearance for a re-release and Q&A session of his film “Sabor”,” an international hit some thirty years ago … say, didn’t Almodóvar first endear himself to the non-Spanish masses with Women of the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown some thirty years ago? That’s quite a coincidence. Which, assuming there’s a real-life parallel, makes the next part a tad alarming: Getting together with his estranged lead actor Alberto Crespo (Asier Etxeandia), Salvo, on Alberto’s prompting, decides now is a good time to take up heroin. And yes, “chase the dragon” is the exact metaphor used in Spanish as well.
Meanwhile, all this talk of old movies and drug abuse has made Salvo positively wistful about the time when his mom was Penélope Cruz and they all lived in cave. Of course when you live in a cave with a hot mom, your ten-year-old thoughts naturally lead to the ill-educated handyman in their settlement. Mom negotiates a deal for the boy to teach the handyman how to read and write in exchange for some choice cave interior whitewalling.
In case you’re not following, this is essentially what the film is about: a present in which a broken old man decides now’s the right time for a heroin addiction and a past in which a small boy teaches a blue-collar worker how to read. You know, Pedro, I don’t want to be this guy, but … your films used to explore challenging subjects. This feels like someone got hold of random pages of your diary.
It’s a shame Pain & Glory didn’t win this year’s Palm d’Or at Cannes (’twas nominated); it is exactly the kind of film Cannes has overrated for years. I grudgingly accept that the past two winners –Parasite and Shoplifters– are both great films. You know how it pains & glories me to admit this. Point is, however, that this delve into the life of l’il Pedro is -shockingly- even less hard hitting than our look at little Alfonso Cuarón from 2018’s Roma.
If it’s another director, I snore this film right off the screen. Pedro makes Pain & Glory relatively watchable, but at the end of the day this viewer is on the verge of a mental shutdown. I’m so happy l’il Pedro got his jollies spying on his illiterate mantoy, but that hardly makes for compelling viewership.
Not every plot has to be nicked
Yet how could I dare to predict?
Who needs bug-eyed
Macabre homicide
When we can watch gramps, the burgeoning addict?
Rated R, 113 Minutes
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Writer: Pedro Almodóvar
Genre: Rememberin’ stuff, really kinda commonplace stuff
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Critics, Almodóvar homies
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Me, apparently
