Bad Education

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Film Description

This semi-autobiographical offering from Almodovar tells the story of aspiring film-maker Fele Martinez, who gets involved with a childhood love who is not all he appears to be. Also serving as a tribute to the classic Hollywood melodrama, Bad Education is awash with film references.

Film Information

DVD Extras

Making-of montage; Artwork gallery; Costume design gallery; Deleted scenes; Press book; Photo gallery; Cannes film festival photography; Trailers; TV Spots.

Technical Details

Film Media

6 Stills

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1 Trailer

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Reviews & Articles

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Review by Alex Davidson on 14th October 2004

Almodovar is one of those rare directors who seem to improve with every film they make. Talk To Her, one of the very best films of the new millennium, marked a new maturity in his filmmaking, a trend that continues with Bad Education.

The film concerns a young filmmaker (many critics have been quick to draw parallels with Almodovar himself), played by Fele Martinez, who is visited by a man claiming to be his old schoolfriend (Gael Garcia Bernal). The man hands the director a script supposedly based on their childhood at a Catholic school run by pederast priests. The film then switches its timeline, flashing back to the friend’s fictionalised version of the past, and it soon becomes clear that the man is not all that he seems. Thus begins the rich web of ambiguities and changing timelines that make Bad Education such a riveting watch, and one that rewards repeated viewings.

Unusually for Almodovar, the focus of his narrative is on the male characters (the bad education of the title could refer to the absence of females in the male protagonists’ formative years), and the actors give some extraordinary performances. The film confirms Bernal as one of the most exciting actors around; after impressing in Y Tu Mama Tambien and Amores Perros, he gives a nuanced performance here, delineating a wide variety of identities as one of the most complex characters in recent cinema history.

Almodovar’s films are full of extreme characters, who, in the hands of a less talented director, could appear to be grotesque caricatures whose outlandish (and frequently egregious) conduct could distance audience empathy. However, the Spanish auteur is adept at handling these eccentric figures, and even the movie’s chief villain elicts sympathy by the film’s climax. It is this generosity that Almodovar extends towards his characters that make him one of the most fascinating auteurs working today.

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Collections & Lists

This film is part of the following Film Collections

Best Melodramas

Including: A Star Is Born, All About My Mother, An Affair To Remember, Bad Education, Black Narcissus, Bonjour Tristesse, Brief Encounter (1945), Broken Blossoms, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Dallas (Seasons 1 & 2).

Films About Filmmaking

Including: A Star Is Born, Adaptation, Bad Education, Bollywood Hollywood, Boogie Nights, Camera Buff, Celebrity, Day Of The Locust, Ed Wood, Fellinis 8 1/2.

The Best of Gay and Lesbian Cinema

Including: 100 Days Before The Command, 15, All About My Mother, Another Way, Bad Education, Beau Travail, Beautiful Thing, Blue Gate Crossing, Boyfriends, Boys Dont Cry.

View all collections

This film is part of the following Customer Film Lists

Films to 'Come of Age' To. by Nicholas Quirke

Innocence Defiled

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