What Have I Done to Deserve This? (1984)

Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Starring: Carmen Maura, Luis Hostalot, Ángel de Andrés López, Gonzalo Suárez, Verónica Forqué, Chus Lampreave

In Madrid, the housewife Gloria lives in a tiny apartment with her husband, the taxi driver and forger Antonio; her lunatic mother-in-law, who is addicted in bottled water and cupcakes; and two teenage sons, one of them a drug dealer and the other gay. Gloria works as cleaning lady to raise some money for her dysfunctional family and is addicted in pills; her best friend is her neighbor, the call-girl Cristal. Antonio has a secret passion on a decadent German singer for whom he had worked as driver in Germany. A writer tries to convince Antonio to forge letters from Hitler and travels to Germany to meet the singer to invite her to participate in the scheme. Meanwhile Gloria delivers her gay son to a pervert dentist. Her mother-in-law finds a lizard while walking with her grandson on the street and they call it Dinero (Money) and bring it home. When Gloria has an argument with Antonio, she hits him on the head with a piece of wood, killing him. Now the police detectives investigate the murder case.

Early Almodovar is something that always keeps me fascinated! He's absolutely free of all his refined technical skills (latest films) and a real "hooligan", provoking, and full of brilliant jokes. "What have I done to deserve this?" is one of my top-Almodovar films, due to magnificent acting of Carmen Maura but not only. Almodovar, not yet burdened by the reputation of "maestro" is extremely free in expression, he does everything what is allowed and "not allowed" to do in cinema. Terrific mixture of Italian neo-realism, (remember the last episode, when Carmen sees off her family and returns home..) marvelous sarcasm, parody on intellectual cinema, and a tart-like melodrama with too much sugar. This is called Almodovar, a genius who is not afraid to seem foolish and therefore never seems foolish. A genius of KITSCH!

Haven't seen this film yet? What a lucky one you are! Be prepared for unforgettable impressions.

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