Review: Parallel Mothers

Image courtesy of Sony Pictures Classics.

 

Pedro Almodovar's latest film, "Parallel Mothers," is the director's most overtly political film, and while it often plays like a thriller - in the way that "Bad Education" or "Volver" did - the characters end up in a place that surprised me. Almodovar utilizes elements that you've come to expect from his films - both melodrama and suspense revolving around a mystery - but in many ways his latest feels somewhat like a departure for the director.

The film's political subplot is what kicks the story into gear, and it's mostly left hanging for much of the film's running time, but then brought back into the foreground during the finale in a manner that feels organic. Janis (Penelope Cruz in one of her best performances) is a photographer who, when we first meet her, is photographing a forensic archaeologist named Arturo (Israel Elejalde). 

Janis enlists Arturo in a project to find and dig up the remains of her great grandfather, who was one of a group of men who went missing many years ago during the fascist Franco regime and was believed to be murdered and buried somewhere in her hometown. Arturo agrees to bring her proposal before the group for which he works, and the two end up having an affair.

But when Arturo tries to convince Janis to have an abortion after their affair - he's married, by the way - results in her pregnancy, she tells him that they should probably split up. In the maternity ward, Janis befriends Ana (Milena Smit), a 17-year-old girl who is also pregnant, but much less joyful about the prospect of being mother than Janis is.

Once these two strike up a friendship, it becomes the central focus of the picture. Janis is irritated by her current au-pair, who appears to be more interested in doing her schoolwork than caring for Janis's baby, so she fires the girl and asks Ana - whose child, we learn, was lost due to a "crib death" - to move in with her to take over the role.

It's hard to discuss the film's plot much further without giving away some key details and twists, so suffice it to say that an offhand comment from Arturo that angers Janis leads to some investigation - and a shocking discovery is made. The film's suspense during its second half is the manner in which we expect the story to pan out - and suffice it to say, it won't likely end well for some of the characters.

However, and I don't believe this constitutes a spoiler, the film doesn't end up exactly where one might expect it would. The film's final scenes find the characters focusing on the future, but at the same time honoring the past. Each of the two women in the film are, at varying points, naive about one element of their lives, but correct about other things.

The subplot involving the remains of the villagers murdered by the Franco regime is mostly missing during the film's middle half when the story about Janis and Ana's relationship takes over, but it pops back up at the ending in a manner that works well within the confines of the story - especially in terms of how it views the concept of lingering on the past vs. looking toward the future - and the result is quite moving.

Cruz gives one of her finest performances, and her work here is a reminder that many of her best moments have been through her collaboration with Almodovar, who has long been Spain's greatest living filmmaker. His previous film, "Pain and Glory," was his best in more than a decade, and while "Parallel Mothers" doesn't, perhaps, quite reach those heights, it's also better than most of his decade-worth of films prior to "Pain and Glory." "Parallel Mothers" may, at first, appear to have the trappings of a typical Almodovar melodrama, but it has a lot more on its mind and is often full of surprises.