Blurring The Lines

            In watching Pedro Almodovar’s All About My Mother, I was struck by the ending dedication, which states:

To all actresses who have played actresses, to all women who act, to men who act and become women, to all the people who want to be mothers… to my mother.

Throughout the film, there is an emphasis on the role of acting. By virtue of it being a movie, the characters intrinsically “act,” however men act as women, women act as mothers, and each of the parts assume a role that is either thrust upon them or chosen. I found that the stress placed upon the idea of acting enlightened the viewer to the larger blurring of established roles throughout society.

            Femininity and motherhood play a large part in All About My Mother, as we see Manuela experience the loss of her son and return to Barcelona to confront the life she had run from 18 years prior. After the death of her biological child, Manuela continues to embrace a maternal role, becoming a surrogate parent to a variety of women. We first see her at “The Field,” helping La Agrado and, later she becomes a caregiver to both Huma Rojo and Sister Rosa. Blurring the line between motherhood and friendship, Manuela takes these dependents under her wing and becomes a large part of their lives. Manuela takes on the role of a caregiver, and acts as a mother to the characters throughout the film, ultimately defining her role as a human being.

            More distinctly, the lines between genders are blurred throughout the movie through the variety of transgendered characters.  In La Agrado’s candid speech, she says that, “you are more authentic the more you resemble what you’ve dreamed of being,” which reinforces the idea that in acting a part the characters throughout the film are actually being truer to themselves. In this way, we see that the role of acting is not to obscure the truth, but rather to illuminate it. I found that this reinforced the idea that one can therefore author their own story, rather than rely on the predisposed role they are born into. This juxtaposition of performance and reality that exists throughout the film allows for the viewer to question all traditional and accepted societal roles.

The Unconventional Motherly Roles in All About My Mother

            The film All About My Mother depicts a plot full of contradiction of social conventions with some very unconventional female characters. One of the conventions that the film depicts upon would be the role of a mother. Society generates the role of mother to be one between the biological mother and her child. At the beginning of the film, it depicts this normal relationship between Manuela and Estefan as a mother and her son. Though the film introduces this conventional motherly role at the beginning, the rest of the film illustrates the lives of several other characters that take upon some motherly role against their typical status within society. Rosa’s mother, Manuela, Agrado, and Huma play unconventional, motherly roles towards one of the other characters within the film.

            Huma, an older actress, has an intimate relationship with Nina, a younger actress. Possibly, due to Huma’s maturity, Huma provides a motherly role to Nina. When talking about her relationship to Manuela, Huma says “She’s hooked on junk, but I’m hooked on her.” Huma cares and provides protection for Nina as she struggles with her drug addiction. Even though Nina is not Huma’s daughter, the film describes their relationship as lovers, but also as mother-to-daughter relationship. This relationship does not depict the normal motherly role, but it still depicts the care and protection that a mother provides to her child even if it is unconventional. Another instance of an unconventional motherly role is Rosa’s mother. Since Rosa’s father has Alzheimer’s disease, her mother takes upon the duty to constantly take care of him. Inevitably, Rosa’s mother applies a motherly role to the care of her husband. As she denies Manuela’s service to cook and take care of the husband, she states to Rosa “I prefer to look after your father myself.” While she cares for her husband, she neglects the conventional role of a mother to her own daughter. As Rosa’s pregnancy becomes risky, Manuela devotes her time to caring for her. Once Rosa tells Manuela that she is HIV positive and has told none of her colleges or her mother about this and her pregnancy, Manuela says to her “We will go for your things now, and you’ll move in here.” She realizes that Rosa needs her to play the motherly role, as she has nowhere to go for help. Even though Manuela is not her real mother, Manuela cares and provides for Rosa during her pregnancy. Even though Rosa is becoming a mother as well, Manuela takes upon the responsibility to Rosa’s child, Estefan. At first, Manuela plays the part of being Huma’s assistant by taking care of Nina and her during the shows. This relationship also reveals a motherly role. Though Manuela cannot continue with this job as she takes care of Rosa, Agrado accepts this job to take care of Huma and Nina. Even though Agrado’s history appears to make her unfit for this role due to social standards, Huma and Nina rely upon Agrado’s motherly care and assitance. Agrado gives advice to Nina and says “…You’ve got talent-limited talent, but you got it. Above all, a woman who loves you. And you trade it all for junk. You think it’s worth it? Well, it isn’t. It isn’t worth it.” Agrado gives advice to Nina as she provides a motherly role to her. Even if Agrado is not of the conventional mother, Agrado performs motherly actions as she cares for Nina and Huma.

The entire film dedicates itself to contradicting these social norms and providing circumstances that reveal roles that do not have the same, conventional characters. The motherly roles that Manuela preforms for Rosa, Agrado for Nina and Huma, Huma for Nina, and Rosa’s mother to Rosa’s father reveal unconventional characters can play roles that society does not assign them. The motherly roles within the film are unconventional to contradict social norm. The film reveals this disregard for normal conventions as it depicts the several motherly roles played by its unconventional, female characters. Society assigns specific roles to specific types of people, but in All About My Mother, it obliterates these conventions and allows them not to define the characters due to their status in society, but of who the characters are and become. 

Defying Social Expectations

Pedro Alamadóvar’s “All About My Mother,” contrasts ideas of what is good and what is not. Throughout the film, there are characters who do not fit the mold of their profession or their past. Agrado is a perfect example. Agrado makes a living through prostitution, has had many plastic surgeries, and uses vile language – none of which are things that society would celebrate. However, “All About My Mother” gives an up close view of Agrado, shows that she is in fact a genuine, person of high character, which contrasts the stereotype of her lifestyle, and exemplifies the theme that authenticity does not rely on social norms.

            Throughout the film, it is evident that Agrado is a genuine person how she cares about others. Agrado is robbed of all her valuables when she takes in Lola off the streets and lets Lola stay with her. When Manuela performs the role of Stella in the play, Agrado brings over ice cream to celebrate. When Nina is shooting up in the bathroom, Agrado tries to tell her of her best interests. When Manuela returns with the news of Rosa’s son, Esteban’s health, Agrado tells her how much she prayed for him. Through her authentic compassion for others, Agrado defies the stereotype of a selfish prostitute, but she also demonstrates her authenticity through her speech at the theater.

Agrado’s big moment in the film happens when the show is to be cancelled because Fuma and Nina are both in the hospital. Knowing that the audience came for a show, Agrado goes on stage so that they will have something to take away from the experience. She talks about all her cosmetic surgeries and concludes by saying, “It costs a lot to be authentic ma’am, and one can’t be stingy with these things… because you are more authentic the more you resemble what you’ve dreamed of being.” Agrado is authentic in that she has dreamed of being beautiful, and of making money, and has taken charge of her life to do just that, which shows Alamadóvar’s theme of Authenticity does not rely on conventional norms.

Digging Deeper: The Misleading Nature of Face Value

A defining theme of the movie “All about my Mother” is the importance of appearance. In scene after scene, Manuela, the main character, is misjudged – judged a prostitute, an overambitious aspiring actress, or even as a drug addict. Although she is a respectable and honorable woman, she is judged to be otherwise by people who know her not. In several ways, this parallels Dionysus’ existence in the Bacchae. Both Dionysus and Manuela are held back from their rightful places in society by people holding erroneous preconceptions. Although Manuela and Dionysus take different routes to overcome these obstacles, both works stress the importance of not judging someone by their appearance.

                All about my Mother includes many characters who are misjudged, but few are more misjudged than Manuela herself. Manuela herself is initially presented as a nurse, a relatively respectable position in society. As the plot develops and she travels to Barcelona, however, we learn that earlier in her life she was a prostitute that had travelled to Madrid as a way to erase her earlier life. In contrast, the Bacchae opens telling us who Dionysus is, a god, and then goes on to tell us how he hides his divinity. Both plots open with the main character taking on the appearance of something new. Both characters go on to interact with people that judge them based solely off their appearance. When Manuela goes to take the job at Rosa’s mother’s house, she is dismissed immediately based on her attire. Rosa’s mother’s prejudice blinds her to Manuela’s capable skills and reformed nature, which she could have deduced with a few simple questions. In the same way, Pentheus dismisses Dionysus when the god’s appearance doesn’t match his own ideals of manhood (let alone godhood). If he had listened to the god’s preaching or even requested for a small miracle as proof, he might have saved himself as well as his city. Both Pentheus and Rosa’s mother take the main characters at face value, without taking the time to ascertain whether their appearance hid something more.

                Ultimately, both Manuela and Dionysus manage to disprove the stereotypes through their actions, ensuring a happy ending for them, but their detractors suffer as a result of their preconceived ideals. Manuela’s good treatment of Rosa finally convinces Rosa’s mother as to her goodness, but because of her initial disbelief she misses out on the last few months’ of her own daughter’s life, forced to watch a stranger do what she should have done herself. Similarly, Pentheus’ disbelief leads to the destruction of his family and his city as well as his own death. Their preconceptions, while doubtlessly valid in some cases, ultimately harmed them.

Color as a Narrator

In Pedro Almodóvar’s film Todo Sobre Mi Madre(All About My Mother) the use of color is employed greatly throughout the film. For the audience, sight is a very important, because it is one more medium through which the narrative is transmitted. Color, or lack thereof, is a vital part of this visual means through which the story is told to the audience. Almodóvar takes advantage of it in the telling of this narrative because it influences the emotions and senses of the audience. In fact, color is so dramatically used in some situations that the stories of these women are seemingly narrated by its use, as if it had a role of its own in the film.

The use of color is an artistic technique that persists throughout the entirety of the film. This allows the audience to really take note of its vibrant qualities in some moments and its muted nature in others. This application enables the audience to build a relationship with the use of color the way they would be able to do with another character in the film. Color acts as a visual stimulant for the audience, and the director plays with this in extremes in the film. The scenes tend to be either extremely colorful and lively or dull and monochromatic. For example, the scenes in Madrid are expressed by a lack of the vibrant colors that are often utilized in other scenes of the movie, which is not to say that color is not utilized in certain scenes and they come out as black and white, but rather that the color comes out muted and dark. The character of the narration becomes gloomier at this point in the film. This is representative since her son’s accident happens in Madrid. After she moves to Barcelona and begins to pick up and put back together the pieces of her life, the scenes burst with brilliant colors. At this point, the nature of the narration that color supplies is much more lively. These lively colors deliver a big impact on the audience, because they are such a visual stimulant, but also because they come to represent Manuela and the other women working through their hardships to continue with life.

The use of color in the extremes captures the attention of viewers making them note its importance to the telling of the narrative. It is the relationship the audience can build with the use of color because of its persistence throughout the film’s entirety and the way in which it highlights the significance of certain themes in the lives of the women in order to help communicate their stories that personify color for the viewers. Color takes on a role of its own in the film, similar to that of a narrator, because it is always there to help express the story. 

Visual Mirroring and its Relationship to Manuela's Grief

            Almodóvar’s film, “All About My Mother” chronicles Manuela’s grief over the loss of her son, Esteban. Throughout Manuela’s grieving process, there are several instances of visual repetition. These repetitions are easily apparent and highlight the changes occur from one scene to the next. Although Manuela and her situation has developed or changed, the other visual elements in the scene remain stagnant. Through these visual cues, it is clear that Manuela’s grief is a personal tragedy. Though Manuela’s life drastically changes because of her son’s death, her surrounding environment remains unchanged.

            One of the first instances of these repetitions occurs almost immediately after Esteban’s death.  Earlier in the film, Manuela acts in a video educating doctors on how to speak with families of the recently deceased about organ transplants. After Esteban’s death, Manuela plays the same role in a similar scene, as two doctors talk to Manuela about the possibility of donating Esteban’s organs to transplant patients. The scene is strikingly similar visually, despite the emotion trauma that Manuela is now enduring. This illustrates that Esteban's death does not have a significant impact outside of Manuela. While Manuela’s coworkers may show sympathy, it does not change the fact that Esteban’s organs are viable for transplants and can help others. Even though she has personal relationships with the people working at the hospital, Manuela is subjected to the same treatment all the other families receive. The scene when Manuela goes to see the play again after Esteban dies is another example of visual mirroring. The composition of the scene looks the same as when Esteban was present, but the seat next to Manuela is empty. The stagnancy of the rest of the scene shows that Manuela’s external environment is unchanged by her son’s death. The tragedy that Manuela has endured equates to selling one less ticket for the play, as it is not apparent to those outside of Manuela.

            These strong visual cues indicate a contrast between the immediately apparent and the truth. The idea introduced through these repetitions continues as Manuela interacts with other characters that do not know that her son has died. This illustrates Manuela’s grief and attempt to overcome it as a personal struggle that leaves her external environment largely unchanged.