I have made no secret about the fact that I fucking love Pedro Almodóvar on this blog, but I feel, now, it’s time to deep-dive into one of his movies, with the intention of strong-arming anyone reading into watching it. If you’re reading this, consider clearing your schedule for tonight, because I am about to make a case for Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (originally released in Spain as Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios), Almodóvar’s batshit 1988 masterpiece.
Pedro Almodóvar has some interesting – and downright excellent – films that came out before Women on the Verge, but this is the first one that really distils all of his iconic stylistic elements into one functioning whole. Pepa Marcos (Carmen Maura) is a TV actress dealing with the heartbreak she suffered after her lover, Ivan, a fellow actor, dumped her – tormented by his voice in the dubbed versions of classic movies they did together, she goes to her apartment for a moment of respite. Only to find, uh, that her best friend has actually been dick-hypnotized into accidentally alinging herself with terrorists, her ex-lover’s estranged son Carlos (Antonio Banderas) is looking to buy her apartment, her fridge is filled with sleeping pill-laced gazpacho and Ivan’s ex-wife is out of a psych hospital and out for blood.
To call it a deranged film isn’t unfair, but it’s not entirely accurate, either. Overlapping plots, each more bizarre and outlandish than the last, pile up on top each other in this madcap fashion that would turn into an ungainly mess in the hands of any other director, but Almodovar, at this point in his career and in his movies going forward, had honed this inimitable skill of balancing this great wobbling jenga-tower of stories and characters and themes and finding the common thread to draw them all into one coherent whole.
It’s a work of art, really, the way he makes these stories fit together; with Pepa’s gorgeous apartment serving as the stage the characters wander in and out of, dressed in some of the most outrageously 80’s fashion you’ve ever laid eyes on in your life. It never feels out of his control, even though it so easily could slide through his fingers – right until the last moment, it’s perfectly-pitched, a balance of tones and genres and characters that coalesce into this gleefully odd masterpiece, a screwball comedy romantic thriller with furry taxis and spiked soup. Witty, catty, sexy, stupid – this movie honestly has it all.
And his command behind the camera is really what pulls it all together. For all the daftness in Women on the Verge, it’s also a stunningly-crafted piece of cinema – a long shot introduces Pepa dubbing over a classic feature, the camera tracking the beam of light from the projector in a darkened room. The rich, sumptuous colour pallette fills out every frame with eye-catching mise-en-scene, and the blend of old-school cinematic styles and Almodóvar’s take on contemporary queer cinema is a joy to behold.
More than anything, though, Women on the Verge drips with a joyful energy that’s impossible not to get caught up in. Almodóvar’s adoration for cinema past and present is all over this movie, and, if you’re a film lover, it’s made for you, too. The gleeful silliness matched with this incredible respect for and love of the power of film turns it into a classic, for me, and to this day, one of Almodóvar’s most watchable and masterful works.
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By Lou MacGregor
(header image via Mubi)
No But Listen 
Reblogged this on The Cutprice Guignol.
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