"Bad Education" by Pedro Almodovar

I won't even try to get into unravelling the twists and turns in his movie -- which beside giving the story away would also not make any sense when put in writing. Because, I think Almodovar employs his multi-layered storytelling as a very powerful cinematic technique -- mixing "reality" with fiction. One has to watch this movie to get the visual shocks when people turn out to be not who you thought they were, when you see a movie being shot within the movie and you forget which the original story was...after all, this movie is very much about identities...

Now, being a fan of everything Gael Garcia Bernal does makes it hard for me not to praise him effusively...but I'll just say he is as vital and feral and sensual as ever....I was also impressed by the intensity and moodiness portrayed by Fele Martinez who plays Enrique Goded.

A story of two schoolmates, Ignacio and Enrique, who fall in love with each other and are later separated by a priest at their boarding-school who covets one of them (Ignaciao), it showcases many a tortured relationship and instances of confused conventional identities. While it might be a statement about pederasty and the prieshood, lost innocence and ruptured identities, Almodovar seems to have more going on. The multiple stories, or rather the confusion of identities and the surprises seem to be a device to beguile the audience as well. The sense of perspective, of a solid past and a present and future are challenged; just when you think you understand where the movie is at in the story's timeline, you are suddenly taken to another point in time.

This is a movie about "passion" also, as Almodovar explains in his interview...and I think that the many relationships portrayed, the many characters peopling the movie: sinning priests, gays, transsexuals: all have their passion bylines, parts that make up the whole, passion which is lust, passion which is love and passion which is also crime.