All About My Mother

Pedro Almodóvar’s Todo Sobre Mi Madre (All About My Mother) began shooting this day in 1999. Like his most recent film Volver (2006), Todo Sobre Mi Madre is a story of how the family structure adapts to change. Almodóvar’s visuals are a rich mosaic of strong colors and unusual camera angles. The family narrative encompasses the life stories of more than two or three individuals, bringing up questions of the nature of family among those unrelated by blood, and the nature of gender and sexuality in the formation of family. Appropriated scenes from Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire add a motif to the mosaic that evokes questions on the nature of gender as performance.

Awards: Todo Sobre Mi Madre won a 2000 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film. Pedro Almodóvar’s next movie, Hable Con Ella (Talk to Her), won him an Oscar in 2003 for Best Original Screenplay and a nomination for Best Director.