Details
Movie Description
In this powerful semi-autobiographical film, acclaimed Spanish director Pedro Almodovar (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER, TALK TO HER) tracks the formative experiences of his coming of age in a Catholic boys school. While the film benefits from Almodovar's limitless range of color, beauty, and moving expression, the themes presented are dark and difficult. Pedophilia, lost love, mistaken identity, manipulation, drug addiction, and desperation prevail, giving this otherwise sexy and vibrant film a chilling subtext.
Gael Garcia Bernal gives a jaw-dropping performance, playing two of the main characters. First, he plays a screenwriter named Ignacio, who reunites with his childhood friend, Enrique (Fele Martinez), a filmmaker, to sell him a script called "The Visit." He also plays the star of "The Visit"--a gorgeous cross-dresser and drug addict named Zahara. Enrique instantly realizes that the script is the story of their childhood, where they met and fell in love, only to be torn apart by a jealous pedophilic priest, Father Manolo (Daniel Gimenez-Cacho). However, Ignacio looks nothing like the boy that Enrique remembers as his best friend and first love. As the mystery of their past begins to unfold, layers of lies and deception are peeled away to reveal a delicate core of innocence lost. Almodovar's message is not one of hopelessness--it is rather a recognition of the inevitable hardening of the soul that is fundamental to survival in a less-than-perfect world.
Film Notes
DVD Features:
Anamorphic Widescreen - 2.35
Audio:
Dolby Digital 5.1 - Spanish, Latin
Subtitles - English - Optional
Additional Release Material:
Audio Commentary - 1. Pedro Almodovar - Director
Deleted Scenes
Behind the Scenes - 1. Making of BAD EDUCATION
Trailers - 1. Sony Pictures Previews
THEATRICAL RELEASE: NOVEMBER 19, 2004 (LIMITED)
Industry Reviews
"[A] voluptuous experience that invites you to gorge on its beauty and vitality."
New York Times - Stephen Holden (11/19/2004)
"Garcia Bernal exhibits a willingness to be daring. He also is a prodigious talent..."
USA Today - Claudia Puig (11/19/2004)
"[The] director is unsparing in depicting all the corruption that the passionate are prone to. It's tough stuff, and it's another great achievement by a filmmaker on a roll."
Premiere - Glenn Kenny (12/01/2004)
"It's a film noir that grows more potent as its secrets are revealed."
Entertainment Weekly - Owen Glieberman (11/26/2004)
"Garcia Bernal, in and out of drag, gives a juicy, jolting performance....He is the corrupt soul of a mesmeric movie that offers temptations impossible to resist."
Rolling Stone - Peter Travers (12/09/2004)
"Almodovar is at his most breathtakingly complex and mature..."
Los Angeles Times - Carina Chocano (12/10/2004)
"Almodovar wants to intrigue and entertain us, and he certainly does, proving along the way that Gael Garcia Bernal has the same kind of screen presence that Antonio Banderas brought to Almodovar's earlier movies."
Chicago Sun-Times - Roger Ebert (12/22/2004)
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