La Mala Educacion (Bad Education)
Directed & Written by: Pedro Almodóvar
Starring: Gael Garcia Bernal, Fele Martinez, Daniel Giminez Cacho, Lluis Homar
Country: Spain
 
Two and a half Queens
WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT, PEDRO?
Whenever Pedro Almodóvar puts something on the screen we know we're going to be wowed by the visuals and to be left asking ourselves ‘what the hell did he mean by that?' by his richly textured Freudian-style of story telling. In La Mala Educacion, his eye for cinematic detail and range is just as breathtaking as always. However, the story telling, while showing promise in the first reel, loses steam and becomes stagnant by the time the cheesy final frames roll around. Almodovar and his wildly creative imagination are too clever by half.
La Mala Educacion is a story within a film within a film. This should be a delight as each layer is pulled off to uncover another ‘truth', but despite its complexity, by mid-point we know the sum of the parts even though some of the minor details are yet to be revealed. The tension inherent in discovery is lost as we agonizingly watch each piece of the puzzle being put in place. We know where they go long before they're cemented in the tableau.
The story: An old chum from a Catholic boys' school shows up on the doorstep of a famous film director. Their relationship had been short but sweet. The director is in a creative crisis, but he's saved. The friend has brought along a short story about the school and the consequences it birthed. The priests were oppressive and the head priest sexually abusive. His actions had long reaching affects with one of the boys. The director decides to shoot this as his next project and we see two stories unfold: the one being filmed and the present story that reveals mysteries incompatible with the first.
La Mala Educacion is uneven and mostly inaccessible. As the narrative shifts so quickly, it's difficult to have any emotional attachment in the characters or investiture in the story(s). There is one gripping scene of the two boys huddling in fear in a toilet stall as the head priest seeks them out and the transvestite character Zahara is most compelling. But generally, the cold polemic eye of the director is reminiscent of Bergman without the stark landscapes. Almodóvar has said this is only a thinly biographical film, but unlike his other films, he seems to go out of his way to stay away from his emotional core. The director, for instance—famous and homosexual and Almodóvar's ego—is inscrutable to a fault throughout.
Gael Garcia Bernal as Ignacio/Zahara/Angel/Juan shows why he's the international star of now and in the future. His characters—never comfortable in their own skin—capture the screen. Fele Martinez, as Enrique the director, has deep brooding eyes that speak of terrible arrogance when he's given a close up. Father Monolo is suitably played by two actors: Daniel Giminez Cacho, a Ricardo Montalban look-alike as the ‘screen' version and by Lluis Homar, a sometimes laughable Kelsey Grammer knock-off as the ‘real' priest.
The visuals, as noted, are remarkable, rich in colour and texture: from the brilliant tearing and dramatic opening credits, to Zahara's playful eyes, to the splitting of Ignacio's face by a stream of blood.
There are scenes with blow jobs and anal sex. I mention this only in that two elderly ladies in the screening I went to lasted five minutes before they decamped. Perhaps they have open minds but could do without the graphic portrayal. Or maybe they wanted Racing Stripes and got in the wrong theatre. If you're either of these categories, be forewarned.
My favourite scene in the film was watching a young Ignacio sing Moon River to a six-string guitar backup from Fr. Manolo. The lyrics were wonderful and I didn't hear a damn thing about ‘wider than a mile' or a ‘huckleberry friend'. It was enlightening. I kid you not.
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