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.