The Room Next Door

After two short films in English, Pedro Almodóvar delivers his first feature not in his native Spanish with The Room Next Door. And he somehow succeeds in the task: the film has the same integrity of his recent works, since his soapy dialogues are just as bad in any language.

It definitely feels like an “Almodovar” from the first frames, but this is not necessarily a positive trademark. Strutting random bright colours to paint the screen with endless green furniture and fuchsia shirts is arguably not a style but a mere design choice. And it is no news how the iconic Iberian director became “lazier” in the last couple of decades, limiting his camera movements to uninspired close ups and reverse shots. The cherry on the "tarta" is the usual intrusive, exaggerated, TV-like soundtrack that never abandons the character on-screen. But to each his own, these defining traits of Almodóvarian cinema seem to be the reason why his fans love him so much. Yet, these are not the only stumbles in The Room Next Door…

Once again, Almodóvar sets the plot on familiar grounds, directly addressing death in a self-aggrandising way. Novelist Ingrid, played Julianne Moore, reconnects with her former colleague Martha (Tilda Swinton) when the latter is diagnosed with inoperable cancer. Rather than waiting for the inevitable, Martha chooses her freedom, and through the support of her friend, she embarks on the path of euthanasia. Hugs, kisses, tears- naturally you get the whole cliché package as these wonderfully talented thespians tango between the dense, wordy dialogues on the verge of the emotionally manipulative, searching for melodrama in the obvious. The film’s greatest flaw, disruptive and otherwise intriguing dynamic, is the constant, heavy exposition, where the character unrealistically feel compelled to tell everything, even when most of it is unnecessary, like the entire flashback sequences showing Swinton’s first marriage. They look cheap and gratuitous, and dilute the narrative without allowing it to explore its full potential.

My last disappointing note is on a kiss that is given in one of these flashbacks: on a cinematic scale of kisses, it would rank as the antithesis of Vertigo.