For many, Strange Way of Life will be an entry point to the filmography of Pedro Almodóvar as the veteran director’s second English-speaking project, with a star-studded Hollywood cast to match. As leads, Ethan Hawke has been the dream of romance fans for at least a couple of decades now, while Pedro Pascal is one of the biggest sensations of the last few years. Together they will take on Almodóvar’s queer Western short film, as old lovers Sheriff Jake and rancher Silva.
As great a calling card as that sounds, Almodóvar has been making brilliant cinema since the ‘80s, pushing boundaries and setting standards that the West has scarcely managed to rise to when it comes to LGBT+ and female characters on film. Almodóvar’s deep-rooted fascination with sexuality, gender expression, motherhood, and the female experience, as well as the inseparable connection between those subjects and the sociopolitical past and present of his homeland of Spain, create an incredibly idiosyncratic oeuvre that cannot be replicated.
While a turn towards English-speaking filmmaking with 2023’s Strange Way of Life and 2021’s The Human Voice — with big American stars at the forefront instead of his usual Spanish and Latin American muses — is bound to open Almodóvar up to a whole new audience, his work is so profoundly self-referential, that a deep dive into his past works is almost mandatory. From 22 feature films, and 13 shorts, here is our selection of Almodóvar’s ten most essential movies.
10. Parallel Mothers (2021)
Ana (Milena Smit) and Janis (Penélope Cruz) give birth at the same time. They keep in touch in the early days of single motherhood, but life sends them on separate paths until they meet again months later. The two grow closer and closer, but a shocking reveal turns their whole lives upside down.
Parallel Mothers acts as a great synthesizer of Almodóvar’s most prominent themes — from its complex, resolute, yet at times neurotic female leads, to its boundary-pushing representations of sexual desire, and the backdrop of Francoist repression. For those reasons, although the 2021 film is textbook Almodóvar, it doesn’t feel as groundbreaking as some of his earlier work. Nevertheless, it’s an intense watch, elevated by a steadfast Cruz in a gorgeous fleshed-out performance.
9. What Have I Done to Deserve This? (1984)
In this dysfunctional household, there’s not a single character worth saving, but that’s not the point of Almodóvar’s filmography anyways. Gloria (Carmen Maura) is a housewife and cleaning lady stretched thin trying to keep her family together, addicted to sedatives to keep her from blowing up. Her husband (Ángel de Andrés López) is unfaithful, violent, and useless, her mother-in-law (Chus Lampreave) is annoying, and her two sons are both involved in some dodgy business.
Some might resent me for saying this, but although Antonio Banderas, Rossy de Palma, and Penélope Cruz are hailed as the most prominent of Almodóvar’s muses, it’s Carmen Maura who’s the real icon of his work. And no film, bar maybe Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, is clearer evidence of that than 1984’s What Have I Done to Deserve This?. Either purposefully or by force of circumstance, this film’s dirty, unpolished, and claustrophobic direction and set design differ massively from the director’s later work but make it all the more memorable for it.
8. Talk to Her (2002)
Benigno (Javier Cámara), a nurse, and Marco (Darío Grandinetti), a journalist, start a friendship as they take care of two comatose women, Alicia (Leonor Watling) and Lydia (Rosario Flores). Marco fell in love with Lydia fresh from a painful break-up right before she was badly injured in a bullfighting accident. Benigno, who became a nurse to take care of his elderly mother, has been obsessed with Alicia for a while when the woman is struck by a car and put under Benigno’s care at the hospital.
Talk to Her is an intense watch, especially as a woman, as it reveals an obsessive, entitled, abusive side of male infatuation that we’re universally privy to and terrified of. Still, there’s a sensibility to Almodóvar’s writing in the way he never places judgment upon his characters, and allows them to just exist, as imperfect and troubled as they might be, that just keeps you glued to the screen. The film earned the Spanish master his second Academy Award.
7. Bad Education (2004)
Bad Education is a meta-layered film about artistic creation as it blooms from personal trauma. To explain its characters here would spoil the process of uncovering each of its levels of meaning, so we will simply tell you it stars Gael García Bernal. That should be reason enough to give it a watch.
Our current era marks the highest prominence the world has ever given to discussing the experience of trans people. And it might not seem like a long time, but two decades ago, when Almodóvar made films like All About My Mother and Bad Education, he was forging new territory, empowered by his filmmaking independence and a certain side of Spain that celebrated the non-conforming. This film, as it intertwines sexual abuse within the Catholic Church with the process of sexual self-discovery, won’t give you the vindication you might be looking for, but it does present its central trans character as a full, complex human being, to whom life has constantly denied compassion.
6. Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! (1989)
An obsessed fan Ricky (Antonio Banderas), kidnaps his favorite actress Marina (Victoria Abril), set on making her fall in love with him. That’s it, that’s the film.
Although adorned with what is easily one of Almodóvar’s simplest narratives, Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! is far from straightforward. This cheeky tale of Stockholm Syndrom uses the restraint of a woman to comment on the dynamics of a heterosexual relationship, the appropriation of the woman by the man, as well as the same signature compassion Almodóvar offers all of his “delinquents.” Antonio Banderas is absolutely delicious as the misguided young Ricky, while Victoria Abril enters the Almodóvar cinematic universe with an impressive bang — going on to lead the director’s subsequent film, 1991’s High Heels.
5. Law of Desire (1987)
In bustling Madrid, Pablo (Eusebio Poncela) is a gay film director and writer who is very close to his transgender sister Tina (Carmen Maura). Antonio (Antonio Banderas) is obsessed with the director and will not leave him alone, despite him being in love with someone else. Meanwhile, Tina’s ex leaves her young daughter Ada in her care, and the two develop a loving bond.
As you have probably been able to tell as you make your way through this list, Pedro Almodóvar’s work is a continuous exploration of a lot of the same themes. He does this by creating a number of characters with similar afflictions and placing them in different scenarios that can draw out different responses and conclusions. It’s as if he has these ideas eating away at him, which he explores in script after script, which he then turns into films until he is finally satisfied and can move on to new obsessions. This makes watching his movies extra fun because you can almost see his creative process at work from one to the other, as one character reminds you of another, and one scene is essential to understanding a plot point in a completely different movie. That self-reference and Almdóvarian quirkiness are incredibly evident in 1987’s Law of Desire — the first film the filmmaker’s own production company, El Deseo, ever produced.
4. Volver (2006)
Penélope Cruz is Raimunda, the working mother of Paula (Yohana Cobo) and sister of Sole (Lola Dueñas). Sole returns to her and Raimunda’s small village hometown in La Mancha to discover from her neighbor Agustina (Blanca Portillo) that her deceased Aunt Paula (Chus Lampreave) had been talking to the ghost of her and Raimunda’s mother Irene (Carmen Maura).
Allow me to go out on a limb here and state that no male director has ever understood women the way Pedro Almodóvar does. Guided by the Spanish maestro, this incredible ensemble of actresses creates, in 2006’s Volver, a narrative of such deep generosity, tradition, modernity, life, death, and everything in between, within a web of joys and woes that so accurately represents the female experience. Volver is a masterpiece, that can battle the next three entries in this list for the top spot of Almodóvar’s catalog. Volver is how we enter the big leagues.
3. Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988)
Pepa (Carmen Maura) is dealing with a break-up when her friend Candela (María Barranco) arrives at her house in a state. They’re interrupted by Carlos (Antonio Banderas) and Marisa (Rossy de Palma) who are apartment shopping. After finding out Carlos is her lover’s son and Candela is fleeing from a terrorist group, all hell breaks loose in this screwball comedy.
A lot can be said of the way Almodóvar writes melodrama, which is why this list is filled with it, but his knack for writing the most eccentric of comedies should not be understated. 1988’s Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is almost operatic in the way it builds its core characters’ conflicts and whims. Like a trainwreck you can’t look away from, everything goes so incredibly wrong in this film, it almost becomes perfect. Its characters find liberation in the chaos, creating scenes so genuine they will stick with you for a long time. Lauded by many as Almodóvar’s best, the 1988 classic launched the director’s career to new, international heights, and officially concluded his transition from the mucky punk-rock aesthetic of his earlier work to the colorful symmetry that has come to define him.
2. Pain and Glory (2019)
Salvador Mallo (Antonia Banderas) was once an influential filmmaker but is now old and busted, and struggling with writer’s block. He reaches out to Alberto (Asier Etxeandia), an actor he fell out with, when he learns his old film is getting restored. Twists and turns take him on a journey of nostalgia and healing from wounds, both physical and emotional.
It’s fair to consider Pain and Glory Almodóvar’s most autobiographical work, but then again every single film he makes reveals so much of his life, his upbringing, and his surroundings, that that would be an almost redundant observation to make. While they’re all reflections of the man who makes them, this film in particular reveals not just a life story but a stage in the director’s creative journey where he is far quieter, more contemplative, and yearning. Present now solely in specks are the burning madnesses, passions, and desires of his past films, leaving in their wake a sort of smug satisfaction that can only come from living life fast and hard.
1. All About My Mother (1999)
Manuela (Cecilia Roth)’s son Esteban (Eloy Azorín) dies after getting hit by a car while trying to get an autograph from his favorite actress, Huma Rojo (Marisa Paredes). The tragedy sends Manuela on a journey to Barcelona to find Esteban’s other parent, a trans woman named Lola (Toni Cantó) from her past life. She reconnects with her and Lola’s close friend Agrado (Antonia San Juan), also a trans woman, but her path crosses with Huma again, as well as Rosa (Penélope Cruz), a young nun with an unexpected connection to Lola.
Like many other films in this list, 1999’s All About My Mother is incredibly led by an ensemble of fascinating female characters and equally rivetting actresses. Although its release precedes Bad Education‘s, its portrayal of trans women is a lot more grounded and multilayered, albeit intrinsically connected to the sex work world. The reason why this film is this writer’s top pick for the best Almodóvar film is that it is his most hopeful, heartwarming work to date, rooted in the genuine, altruistic friendships between its leading women. Although surrounded by misfortune, each character approaches life resiliently, refusing to let the world’s injustice define what they want to take from it.
A lot of Almodóvar’s films will make you uncomfortable, and others will leave your head spinning, but All About My Mother will have your heart soaring after you watch it, fighting to see through the tears that you’re unsure came from emotion or laughter. It’s triumphant, in every sense of the word.