A film that strikes a bit odd for my taste but nevertheless a great film and certainly worth seeing, "All About My Mother (Todo Sobre Mi Madre)" is a masterpiece worthy of Fellini by the spanish director Pedro Almodóvar.
The film centers around Manuela (Cecilia Roth), a single mother and nurse who works as a transplant coordinator in a hospital in Madrid. She goes out with her son Esteban (Eloy Azorin) on his 17th birthday to watch a play of Tennesee William's "A Streetcar Named Desire", they wait for the actress Huma Rojo (Marisa Paredes) for an autograph but Esteban is hit by a car while he was chasing the cab she was riding in for an autograph.
Manuela eventhough full of grief agrees to have her son's heart be transplanted to another man, she tracks him down but this doesn't satisfy her. She quits her job and returns to Barcelona to find his son's father Lola (Toni Canto), it was not implied what kind of person Lola was until we see Manuela visit a square full of prostitutes and transvestites.
She gets out of the cab and helps an old friend named Agrado (Antonia San Juan) who was being assaulted. We find out that they are old friends before Manuela left for Madrid, we also meet Rosa (Penelope Cruz) a nun who works in a shelter for battered prostitutes. We also find out there are connections between the characters and the main protagonist, Rosa turns out to be Huma's daughter and at the same time pregnant with Lola's baby.
The story seemed preposterous and absurd but we've come to believe it more as it unravels, Rosa is also infected with the AIDS virus that he got from Lola. The film is shown more as a soap opera with a cast of characters you would not believe that can be portrayed on screen, Huma the actress turns out to be a lesbian who is also involved with her co-star Nina (Candela Pena) who has a drug problem. Nevertheless we learn to symphatize with most of the characters, in my opinion it was Antonia San Juan playing a man trying to be a woman who stole the show. She looked horrendous playing a transvestite but you can't take your eyes off her/him, Agrado's presence is magnetic and draws you in with her light hearted humor. But no matter how funny certain situations can get each of the characters show the hurt and misery they are in, the director brilliantly blends the dark and lighter side of their lives as they go through their everyday drama especially the heroine Manuela.
We see the heartbreaking meeting between Manuela and Lola as the film progresses, she reveals to him that he also had a son with her showing him his son's picture and the letter that Esteban wrote before he died. Esteban wanted to meet his father no matter what he has become to make himself whole as a person, Manuela made Esteban's wish come true after his death as she and Lola find closure in the tragedy they share.
The director was able to let us see the characters for what they are no matter how ridiculuous the plot maybe, we've come to symphatize Agrado and Lola and even laugh at the some of the minor characters like Nina and the guy who was playing Kowalski. No matter how scandalous or trashy the story and the subject matter might be Almodovar made it look okay to deal with it with care and sympathy, he makes us look at the positive side and showed a glimmer of hope in the ending when Rosa's son Esteban whom Manuela took away did not inherit the AIDS virus.
This makes us believe that you can find love in places you did not expect, we just need to search for it to be content with ourselves like Manuela.
Almodóvar dedicates his film "To all actresses who have played actresses. To all women who act. To men who act and become women. To all the people who want to be mothers. To my mother."
Grade: A
