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The online film magazine Combustible Celluloid offers new movie reviews, DVD reviews, film reviews, actor interviews, actress interviews, director interviews, film books and all things cinema related for the thoughtful and passionate. Online for ten years! Over 3000 reviews!

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Bad Education (2004)

Rating: 3 1/2 Stars (out of 4)

Pupil Watching

By Jeffrey M. Anderson

Buy Bad Education on DVD.

Pedro Almodóvar just keeps improving, even on films as good as All About My Mother and Talk to Her. Bad Education pulls a structural triple-somersault, leaving it nearly impossible to describe, even if it makes perfect sense while watching. In flashback we meet two young boys in Catholic school. They feel the beginning pangs of love, which are abruptly cut short because a priest already has a thing going with one of the boys, Ignacio. Years later, in 1980, Ignacio shows up in the office of the other boy, Enrique (Fele Martinez) now grown up and directing films. Ignacio has become an actor and is interested in working with Enrique. Only he's not Ignacio. It's Ignacio's brother Juan (Gael Garcia Bernal) impersonating him. Later, while Enrique is filming a fictitious version of this very story, the real priest (Daniel Gimenez-Cacho) shows up and tells his version of events, which further casts new light. That Almodovar keeps everything straight during the course of the film is further proof of his delightful talent. Bad Education has the director's usual seriocomic voice, perfectly balancing a tender love story with curdling tragedy using only the slightest touch. But it goes deeper this time. It's more refined and personal, though Almodovar has insisted that the film is not autobiographical. If nothing else, Bernal makes the most stunningly gorgeous drag queen in the history of movies, and more than makes up for appearing in the gutless The Motorcycle Diaries.

See also: Bad Education on Region 2 DVD.

Starring: Gael Garcia Bernal, Fele Martinez, Javier Camara, Daniel Gimenez-Cacho
Written by: Pedro Almodóvar
Directed by: Pedro Almodóvar
MPAA Rating: NC-17 for a scene of explicit sexual content
Language: Spanish with English subtitles
Running Time: 109 minutes
Date: December 22, 2004