Themes: Haunted By the Past, Filmmaking, Dangerous Attraction
Main Cast: Fele Martínez, Gael García Bernal, Gael García Bernal, Gael García Bernal, Daniel Jiménez Cacho, Lluís Homar
Release Year: 2004
Country: ES
Run Time: 104 minutes
MPAA Rating: NC17
Plot
Filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar takes a look at his own adolescence as well as confronting the issue of sexual misconduct in the Catholic Church in this stylish drama, which was chosen to open the 2004 Cannes Film Festival. Enrique Goded (Fele Martínez) is a Spanish filmmaker who is having trouble settling on a new project when he's approached by Ignacio Rodriguez (Gael García Bernal), who was his close friend when they were schoolboys. Goded, who fell in love for the first time with Rodriguez, barely recognizes the man as his former crush, but agrees to read the short story he's written. The tale turns out to be an semi-autobiographical account of their days in a Catholic boarding school, in which a cross-dressing night-club performer named Zahara (also played by Bernal) hooks up with a man named Enrique (Alberto Ferreiro), who turns out to have been his first lover when he was a student. Recalling their school days, Zahara tracks down Father Manolo (Daniel Giménez Cacho), one of his teachers from school with pedophilic tendencies, and threatens to expose the priest's attempts to seduce him and ruin his relationship with Enrique years ago. Goded decides to use the story as the basis for his next film, and Rodriguez, an out-of-work actor, makes it clear he's eager to play Zahara. However, Goded isn't certain if Rodriguez is the right actor for the role, or if he's even the man he claims to be; an angry conflict with Rodriguez leads Goded back to the real Ignacio's mother (Petra Martínez). ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Review
It seems that with each passing film, Pedro Almodóvar's palette gets a little darker. Bad Education is his most somber film to date (with the possible exception of Live Flesh), a brooding drama about past demons returning to the present, about lost love, lost faith, and mistaken identity, all haunted by the strains of "Moon River" and an ancient image of legendary Spanish singer-actress Sara Montiel. The film is filled with allusions to the past, to the repression and corruption of fascist Spain and a Catholic boarding school (like the one Almodóvar attended), but also to a cinematic past that is clearly just as crucial to the world view of Almodóvar and his tormented cast of characters. While Bad Education owes a tremendous debt to classic film noir, it's also an unquestionably personal work, beyond the simple fact that it's about a filmmaker, Enrique Goded (Fele Martínez) grappling with his influences, and with fiction's ultimate usefulness (and inadequacy) in dredging up the truths of the past. Almodóvar has always excelled at writing strong female characters, but he seems to be growing less interested in that kind of projection, as in his last film, Talk to Her, they were all comatose, and in this one they're nonexistent, unless you count the film's cross-dressing "femme fatale," seductively played by Gael García Bernal, and his uproarious sidekick, Paca (Javier Cámara). Almodóvar is an increasingly precise filmmaker, in terms of both image and sound, and this film, while rich and intricate, sacrifices some of the joyful spontaneity of his earlier work. It feels just a bit airless. ~ Josh Ralske, All Movie Guide
The following describes the film's plot in a chronological manner, whereas the various elements actually fall into place for the viewer as the film progresses through flashbacks and also scenes from Enrique's own film based on Ignacio's short story in which Ignacio's brother, Juan, portrays the 80s Ignacio.
Two school boys, Ignacio and Enrique, discover love, cinema, and fear in a religious school at the start of the 1960s. Father Manolo, the school principal and their literature teacher, is witness to and part of these discoveries. On discovering the two boys' affection for each other, the priest, who is himself engrossed with Ignacio, is jealous and threatens to expel Enrique as a 'bad influence'. In an attempt to prevent this Ignacio promises to do whatever the priest asks of him. After molesting Ignacio, the priest expels Enrique anyway.
The film jumps to the 1980s with the boys now young adults. Enrique (Fele Martínez), a successful film director is visited by a stranger (Gael García Bernal) in his office, an actor looking for work who claims to be Enrique's boarding school friend and first love, Ignacio. "Ignacio" has brought a short story with him that is about their time at the Catholic school together and the physical and sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of Father Manolo (Daniel Giménez Cacho). It also includes a fictionalized account of their reunion after all those years.
Enrique wants to adapt Ignacio's story into a film, but "Ignacio's" condition is that he play the part of Zahara, the transsexual lead. Enrique remains skeptical, for he feels that the Ignacio whom he loved and the Ignacio of today are totally different people. He drives to Galicia to Ignacio's mother and learns that the real Ignacio has been dead for four years and that the man who came to his office is really Ignacio's younger brother, Juan.
Enrique's interest is piqued, and he decides to do the movie with Juan in the role of Ignacio to find out what drives Juan. Enrique and "Ignacio" start a relationship, and Enrique revises the script so that it ends with Father Manolo, whom Ignacio was trying to blackmail to get money for sex reassignment surgery, having Ignacio murdered. When the scene is shot, "Ignacio" breaks out in tears unexpectedly.
The movie set is visited by Manuel Berenguer (Lluís Homar), who is none other than the real Father Manolo, who has resigned from Church duty. Manuel confesses to Enrique that the new ending of the film is not far from the truth: the real Ignacio blackmailed Manuel, who somehow managed to scratch together the money but also took an interest in Ignacio's younger brother Juan. Juan and Manuel started a relationship and after a while realized they both wanted to see Ignacio dead. Juan scored some very pure heroin, so that his brother would die by overdose after shooting up.
Enrique is shocked and not at all interested in Juan's weak vindications for what he did to his brother. Finally, before he leaves, Juan gives Enrique a piece of paper: a letter to Enrique that Ignacio was in the middle of typing when he died.
Sara Montiel as Soledad (archive footage) (uncredited)
Production
According to Almodóvar, he worked on the screenplay for over ten years.[1]
Reception
The film received the honor of opening in the 57th Cannes Film Festival in 2004, the first Spanish film to do so.
Overall, this film grossed $40 million worldwide.[2] The film grossed $5.2 million in the United States theatrically[2] - a brilliant success for a foreign-language film.[3]
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