Rating: 
Summary: not for all
Review: Films of Pedro Almodovar are in a certain sense as these of Ingmar Bergman or Woody Allen: good but single- stringed. They have quality, over all in reflecting unexplored, hidden feelings, but if you don't stand in his wavelength, you probably soon dislike this movies. Owing to his irreverency and acid sense of humour one can laugh very much with his first cheap films, but later he has done a more complex dramatic cinema as "Todo sobre mi madre", whose protagonists are invariably homosexual or transexuals, and also battered wise women against the stupidity of common husbands or men who are presented as brutal and idiots. I think the final result of this is what if you are not a transexual or a beaten woman, you can be tired of this movies. It's said in USA there's a percentage of public which expects Spanish films. Almodovar makes to speak his personnages a popular Spanish language but yet so "Spanish" of Spain are more ruled than these from Mejico, California or Tejas. For these people I would want talented filmakers doing more varied movies.
Rating:
Summary: All About Las Mujeres....
Review: I bought this dvd recently at a discount as a previously viewed item. I've always enjoyed Pedro Almodovar's work, especially my favorite, "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown". I had read and heard lots of good things about "All About My Mother" and after watching it, I wasn't let down. Cecilia Roth is excellent as Manela, a mother her loses her only son, Esteban, to a car accident before her very eyes. Grief stricken she decides to run away from Madrid where she lived and return to Barcelona, the city that she left years ago as a young pregnant woman. Once in Barcelona she meets an old friend called La Agrado, a transsexual prostitute, who in turn introduces her to Rosa, a nun, who becomes a new friend. She also finds work with Huma Rojo (played wonderfully by Marisa Paredes) an actress who is touring the country playing Blanche DuBois in Tennessee William's great work, "A Street Car Named Desire". It was this play that she saw with her son the night he was killed, as he was trying to meet Huma Rojo. The story has lots of twists and is always interesting, as you would expect from Almodovar. But it is the relationships between these women that is the real star of this movie. Almodovar explores the depth of friendship and sisterhood between these women but never turns it into a Lifetime Movie. And due must be given to the actresses, in paticular Cecelia Roth, Marisa Paredes and Antonio San Juan. This movie is a great find and I recommend it to all.
Rating:
Summary: It's a womens' world-even the men want to be women!
Review: The death by accident of a mother's much loved son compels her to go to Barcelona and inform the father, who doesn't even know of the boy's existence. Finding the father is not so easy and by going to Barcelona, the mother digs back into a world she had left behind in order to bring up her son. It is a sordid but colourful world with transvestite prostitutes, junkies, an AIDs riddled nun, divas, and the usual associates of one's past. Remember that this is Almodovar, not Ivory-Merchant. However, these people are not displayed as freaks, but portrayed sympathetically. Almodovar celebrates their lives. He does not pass judgement.Like other Almodovar films, the complex story line shows the strains that pull apart and bring together relationships. The emotional lives of the characters are laid bare. While there may be melodrama, there is a strict avoidance of sentimentality. The acting is wonderful, especially Cecilia Roth, who for some reason reminds me of the British actress, Hannah Gordon. My only criticism is the use of coincidence. This is also a feature of other Almodovar's films; but here he stretches it a bit far. For instance, first the Cecilia Roth character steps in to take the part of an actress in a professional stage play, to great acclaim, and then when she leaves it, her transvestite friend, who as far as I know has never acted in his life, effortlessly takes over. This is a small criticism. "All About My Mother" is a splendid film by a great film maker. Without being a dreary feminist polemic, it is a celebration of women in all their roles: as mothers, as lovers, as carers; and to those who want to be women. Warmly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Almodovar's Tapestry
Review: My first experience with All About My Mother was during my Thanksgiving vacation to NYC. I stumbled in a very crowded cinema and the screening was sold out...From the first frame to the very gorgeous closing credits, I was hypnotized and consumed by Almodovar's vision of women that I totally forgot where I was and about the subway roaring under the floor once every 5 minutes. It's not my style to explain or get into the plot because there are countless people who haven't seen this film yet. Every perfomance is breathtaking and the emotional range is rich and complex. As Manuela "sleepwalks" in pain and sorrow through Barcelona, guiding us on her own personal journey, we become interwined into the very exquisite, soulful tapestry of women from every walk of life. On my way to the hotel after the film ended, the women still followed me. And they still do after 5 years.
Rating:
Summary: A very sad and wonderful story
Review: I was genuinely touched by this beautiful film by Almodovar. I would highly recommend it, though it is a tale of loss and grief and the way we recover from grief by moving out of ourselves and back into the world.
Manuela is a organ transplant nurse who matches organ donors to recipients in Madrid. Manuela has also performed in medical education films, showing physicians how to ask greif stricken relatives if they are willing to give up the organs of their deceased loved ones so that they might be used by others. Her beautiful fine son, Esteban, will soon have his 18th birthday and we see Esteban writing entries into his journal which he calls "all about my mother". Manuela takes Esteban to see his favorite actress Huma Rojo play Blanche DuBois in Street Car Named Desire. He is struck by an automobile and dies in the emergency room in the hospital where Manuela works. Manuela's physician colleagues must now ask her for her son's organs so that others might live. The acting is so superb and realistic that I found this film to be almost unbearable at this point. Before his death, Esteban asked his mother to tell him about his father, which she never did. Now she leaves Madrid and returns to Barcelona to find her former lover and tell him about the son he does not know he had. Manuela goes to Barcelona and connects with Huma Rojo, the aging lesbian diva, and becomes her assistant. Huma's life is a mess due to her stormy relationship with her junkie lover. Manuela's kindness and calm organizational skills help her bring order to Huma's life. The fact that Manuela comes out of nowhere to come to Huma's aide reminded me of the Blanche DuBois line: I have always depended on the kindness of strangers. The parallel to All About Eve is also recognizable as Manuela eventually must take to the stage to play Stella when an actress fails to appear at curtain time.
Manuela becomes the helper and emotional support for Sister Rosa, an HIV positive pregnant nun. Rosa has been impregnated by the same man as Manuela 19 years earlier. Manuela cares for Rosa even as Rosa is rejected by her upper-class mother. Rosa tragically dies in childbirth leaving Manuela with a new baby boy.
Manuela tracks down her former lover and finds that he is now a transexual HIV positive drug addicted prostitute. Lola (his new name) and Manuela grieve the loss of Esteban; he grieves the son he never knew while she begins to move out of her grief into a state of compassion. Manuela, in her support for Lola, is showing that she is moving out of her grief through the love and care of others. She moves out of personal grief and into compassion for the world of sadness all around her.
Almodovar develops outlandish characters; lesbian divas, pregnant nuns, and transgendered playboys. Yet they are played with such warmth and empathy that they become real. Manuela plays the archtypal mother, loving, caring, supporting, suffering, grieving, and sympathetic.
Even though this film broke my heart, it is profoundly sad, it also was so beautifully compassionate to all the humans in the story. Manuela must move from incredible grief (the loss of an only son) toward God's view of the world and human suffering so as to move beyond her own pain and suffering. Only a mature and brilliant film maker could produce such a fine film as this. The subtle and sublime are lovingly combined with the outlandish and absurd.
Rating:
Summary: Cecilia Roth was unforgetable!
Review: I have my list of favorite actresses from various countries. To name a few: Juliette Binoche(France), Toni Collette(Austrilia), Emily Watson(England), Sandra Oh(Canada), Shofhreh Agdashloo(Iran),...., and now Cecilia Roth after seeing her in All About My Mother! She stole my heart the minute she screamed when her son got hit my the car early in the movie. It was very emotionally impacting, and the rest of the movie she continue to capture my undevided attention.
Her character had to endured grief after her son died, and she met people from her past, a nun who was HIV positive, played by the makeup-free Penelope Cruz. She reconnects with a friend who is now a pre-op transexual/hooker. She gets to be on stage as a substitute actress. She had to raise Cruz's baby. And she eventually found her ex who is now a transexual and is the father of the Cruz's baby. So she had one heaven of a journey to go through in this film. I enjyed her trmendously!
Rating: 
Summary: Typical Almodóvar film.
Review: That is, a fascinating premise that, while well-acted, manages to fall nearly completely apart because nothing is connected in a way that's necessary to keep the film coherent. It's almost series of vignettes, each weirder than the other, and each making less sense in the "big" story. As a result, it may be somewhat artistic in spots, but spotty as a film. You have to work for it to hold your interest.
Rating: 
Summary: Family Ties
Review: Despite being utterly overrated, "All About My Mother" is still a compelling and well-crafted movie nonetheless. Avoiding the "style over substance" tendencies that marked some of his work, director Pedro Almodóvar delivers a tight and strong cinematic experience with enough drama and comedy to create a relevant achievement. This is a deep story about mothers, sons, and families (conventional or not), with some dysfunctions and problems along the way. The acting is pretty good, the dialogue is realistic and convincing and the direction is adequately intimate and close to the characters. Yet, the movie isn`t as great or remarkable as some seem to claim. Basically, it`s just a well-told story, not a landmark efort. Not great, or even very good, "All About My Mother" is still an interesting melodrama worth checking. Good enough.
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