THE HEROIN’S TALE
For almost 40 years Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar has mined his personal history to create a body of work notable for its dark, risqué humour, lush visual palette and quirky anarchic insouciance. His work has earned him a place among European cinema’s most important voices. Veering between surreal high jinks and sweeping melodrama, the director’s focus on the foibles of the middle class has placed him rightfully as the successor to Spain’s other cinematic giant, Luis Buñuel.
With his 21st film, Pain and Glory,
Almodóvar has created possibly his most forthrightly personal work yet. It is infused with the nostalgia and contemplative regret that accompanies us all as we move towards the later years of our lives.
It’s the story of fictional film director Salvador Mallo (played by longtime collaborator Antonio Banderas) who was once the toast of the film world but hasn’t produced anything for years. Salvador finds himself in a constant battle against the vagaries of age — suffering from back pains, migraines, depression, anxiety and a host of other debilitating ailments. When he’s asked to attend a screening and Q&A of a restored version of a much-admired film of his, Salvador must make amends with his former friend and one-time lead actor Alberto Crespo (Asier Etxeandia).
Plucking up his courage, Salvador makes a visit to Alberto and finds his old friend in similar circumstances to himself but dealing with his problems in a slightly different way thanks to the help of heroin. Salvador decides he’ll try some — after all, what does he have to lose?
Soon the director is deep into his addiction and the drug unlocks long-lost, sometimes painful, sometimes pleasant memories of his impoverished childhood and his difficult relationship with his mother (played in her younger incarnation by another longtime Almodóvar collaborator, Penelope Cruz, pictured). The heroin and its powers of reminiscence lead Salvador towards a creative epiphany and the resolution of a long-forgotten and painful relationship from his past.
With an excellent lead performance from Banderas as Almodóvar’s on-screen greywolf surrogate and a startling and careful use of colours, Pain and Glory shows the director to still be capable of delivering provocative storytelling that lingers with viewers long after the lights have come back on. It’s also a subtle and piercing examination of the not-always-easy-to-pindown ebbs and flows of the creative imagination and it has plenty to say about the nuances and sometimes perplexing bonds between friends, creative collaborators, parents and their children.
It’s also a powerful testament to the need for and benefits of reconciliation, which is something that we can all relate to in a world where so often we tend to shrink into the comfortable certainties of black and white and right and wrong while ignoring the many shades that exist in between.
Finally, Pain & Glory is an undeniable testament to the fact that unlike its protagonist, who is treading water creatively and unable to find his mojo, Almodóvar still has plenty of creativity and cinematic mojo left in him.
Pain and Glory is currently on circuit.