Bad Education (Original Uncut NC-17 Edition) | Francisco Boira, Javier Cámara

Bad Education (Original Uncut NC-17 Edition) | Francisco Boira, Javier Cámara | Bravo!

DVDs:

Bad Education (Ori...

	Bad Education (Original Uncut NC-17 Edition) Francisco Boira, Javier Cámara Sony Pictures, 2005 average customer review:based on 73 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

Writer/director Pedro Almodóvar's dark, sexy Hitchcock homage is his best work since his Oscar-winning All About My Mother, and deepened by a sun-dappled sadness. Handsome, enigmatic Ángel (Gael García Bernal) arrives at the Spanish movie offices of director Enrique Goded (Fele Martinez) and happily proclaims that he's actually Enrique's long-lost school chum Ignacio--an announcement that is both less than convincing and more than it seems. A novice actor, Ángel pitches a semi-autobiographical screenplay in which he's determined to star, a revenge-laden reflection of the doomed love he and Enrique shared as boys before a pedophile priest cruelly intervened. The script, and the lost days it recalls, carefully unfurls into a series of brooding movies-within-movies and memories-inside-memories, which allow the sensual, multiple-role-playing Bernal to give the performance of his young career--among other things, he makes a stunningly convincing drag queen--and Almodóvar the opportunity to movingly suggest that people will pay any price to ensure that their stories are told. --Steve Wiecking

for more information click here

Smokin' in the Boy's Room

Frequently compared to American director, Douglas Sirk, Spain's Pedro Almodovar switches into Hitchcock mode with his twisty, sexually provocative thriller, "Bad Education". Maintaining the bright, primary colors that dominate and help define his films, Almodovar ditches his usual comic archness, and amps up the melodrama in a tale piling layer upon layer of desire, deception, betrayal, and lies, with inevitably murderous results.

Star Gael Garcia Bernal shines in the multiple roles of drag queen, Zahara, bad boy Juan, and the ambitious actor, Angel. A lush-lipped, sensuous film actor, Bernal provides "Bad Education" with a throbbing energy that sets the complicated plot(s) in motion. In 1980's Spain, the boyishly seductive Ignacio arrives at the office of his old, childhood friend, a film director named Enrique. Ignacio has a script based on their alleged boyhood experiences in a Catholic boarding school, most disturbing of which is Ignacio's continued molestation at the hands of pedophile priest, Manolo. In the script, Ignacio grows up to become exotic performer, Zahara, who finally returns to the church to confront Manolo, and the demons of the past. The more Enrique reads of the script, the further the lines between fantasy and reality are blurred. As Enrique is driven to determine the circumstances surrounding an unexplained death, deceptions are revealed; while some characters are not who they seem to be, others resurface in completely different guises. The mysteries deepen, with dark, enigmatic Bernal holding the answers, if not all the cards.

The cinematography is up to Almodovar's usual luxe standards, the writing clever and intense, the plot as engrossing as it is unbelievable. In addition to Bernal's fine acting, Fele Martinez is also excellent in the role of Enrique. He gives a genuinely moving performance as a man who believes (wrongly) that his long-lost love has returned. As Father Manolo, Daniel Gimenez Cacho is effectively slick and creepy as a pedophile taking no chances that his crimes will be uncovered, while Lluis Homar (who looks a little like Kelsey Grammer) is convincing as a horny, blackmailed businessman, whose lust propels him into an ill-advised murder plot.

There's a lot going on here. Because of its myriad plotlines and twists, "Bad Education" is a film that demands attention; otherwise, it's easy to become hopelessly lost in, both, the film-within-a-film and the numerous lies that serve as "backstories" for the characters. There's also a "Vertigo"-like quality to this film, with pedophilia replacing necrophilia as the squirm-inducer.

"Bad Education" is also a very gay film, probably Almodovar's gayest since "Law of Desire" (albeit minus Carmen Maura or that film's over-the-top humor). Almodovar more often works with a company of women actors, allowing their stories to unfold from a distinctly feminine perspective. And while I love "All About My Mother", "Volver", and their sister films, it's interesting to see Almodovar's occasional foray into the testosterone-fueled territory of homoerotica.

While "Bad Education" was released with an NC-17 rating, it isn't especially explicit, so I find that rating puzzling. There is no frontal nudity (except that which is encased in underwear) and the sexual situations are tastefully handled; even the priest/boy interludes are suggestive, rather than in-your-face, no worse than what's been shown on cable television. And aside from the men kissing and some bare behinds, there's not much here that you couldn't see in a PG-13 film, or maybe an R-rated film, at most. "Basic Instinct", for example, is much more explicit than this movie! The movie "Towelhead", in theaters now, reportedly shows more interaction between an adult (male) and minor (female) than "Bad Education", so I have to wonder if there's still not a hint of homophobia present in the current rating system.

While not a delicious wallow like "Law of Desire", "Bad Education" offers a darker, more somber look at the complexity of human behavior and the vaguaries of sexuality. One of Almodovar's best!

for more information click here

Bravo!

That was perhaps one of the most well written, well directed foreign films I've seen in the past few years! There were a lot of graphic sex scenes but they were very tastefully directed. The writing and the plot were original and intriguing. Bravo, Pedro Almodóvar!

a touching, complex story with great performances from the entire cast

A poignant, cinematically-breathtaking film with a plot so convoluted, I'm going to have to rewatch the movie just to see where all the storylines intersect and converge. Gael García Bernal is sexy, charming, and lethal in his layered performance of Ángel, Juan, and Zahara. This is my introduction to Pedro Almodovar and I am pleased to report that I'm intrigued enough to watch the rest of his filmography.

for more information click here

Visually Striking and Audaciously Acted But Ultimately Hollow Inside

Pedro Almodóvar's individualistic filmmaking style is on full display in this florid 2004 melodrama, but oddly, the heart that propelled the wonderful Talk to Her (Hable con Ella) seems to be missing. What results is a rather disappointing addition to the otherwise humanistic Almodóvar canon, a classic case of style over substance. The convoluted plot begins in the present with an apparent flashback about an episode in the past, then presents that story as a film within the film, and finally the two parallel stories become a hybrid that seems to pay tribute to forties Hollywood film noir.

The focal character is Enrique, a young and successful director who is searching for inspiration for his next production. He receives a visit from an old school friend, Ignacio, who provides it with a short story he brings with him called "The Visit". Based on their childhood, it involves Ignacio being sexually abused by a priest at the school they attended together. Indeed, he permitted the abuse in order to get Enrique out of some trouble. Lurid melodrama, as only Almodóvar can serve up, ensues, and an imagined reunion occurs between the abusive priest and the two childhood friends and first-loves. Spinning off Enrique's film-set, the director deftly switches narrative voices to make the abuser the victim, and the moral ambiguity of the central characters becomes heightened. Despite the audacious creativity behind the change in perspective and some strong acting, the problem with this approach is that one ends up not feeling much sympathy for any character in the film.

In a dramatic turnabout from his comparatively stoic Ché Guevara in The Motorcycle Diaries, Gael Garcia Bernal effectively goes for the audacious in playing Juan/Angel, the homme fatal and struggling, petulant actor, as well as the blonde, sultry Zahara, a transvestite and cabaret singer. But even his efforts are not enough to offset the endless layering of the stories and imagined histories that continue to redirect the story ad nauseum. It's too bad since the basic story feels like Almodóvar's most autobiographical film, moving as it does from a Catholic school in 1960s Spain to liberated 1980s Madrid, a period and setting with which the director is personally intimate. He also seems to be making a statement about recent scandals in the Catholic Church where they have willingly turned a blind eye to crimes of abuse against helpless children.

Ultimately, the movie is about his love of depicting erotic role-playing more than anything else and how reality and fiction merge. You will see traces of Hitchcock's Vertigo and Marnie and Billy Wilder's Double Indemnity in the labyrinthine of identities taken on by the characters. The film, nonetheless, falls short of these classics as Almodóvar takes on more than he is willing to commit emotionally leaving the viewer with a rather cold feeling at the end. Granted it has all of the director's omnipresent visual flair, including the striking opening titles and the Bernard Herrmann-like music (courtesy of Alberto Iglesias), this is a disappointment for all the talent involved. The 2005 DVD has quite a few extras starting with an informative and very engaging commentary track from Almodóvar. Two deleted scenes (without subtitles) are included, a total of five minutes, as well as a minute-long behind-the-scenes montage and footage from the red carpet at the AFI Film Festival. There is also an extensive photo gallery and several trailers for the film.

for more information click here

a nonintellectual opine

I purchased this for two reasons, Almoldovar and Gael Garcia Bernal. It depicts the harsh reality of ignorance within religious insitutions. Almoldovar does this very well. I struggle with the movie only because it's just not a happy/go lucky day at the movies. Gael Garcia Bernal is very good in his part, but it's a young man who has been abused and thrown away by an institution he trusted. Just sad, but pretty much speaks to the modern disgusting role that the American Catholic church has played in the lives of young molestation victims.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

products you might be interested in