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Bookmark this pageWhat Have I Done to Deserve This? (1984)
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
Gloria is a typical Spanish housewife - or is she? Her small apartment would seem enough to keep her occupied, housing as it does her indifferent taxi-driver husband, two sons who have discovered the fringe benefits of drug-dealing, and a self-reliant mother-in-law with a pet lizard. But Gloria craves a better life, or at least, for starters, sex with a potent man. In Almodóvar's early feature, the mad inversions and absurdities familiar from Law of Desire and Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown are delivered without the fuss of incorporating the imperatives of, respectively, melodrama and farce. The result is undiluted scabrous humour, with short, sharp scenes and a crazy string of plots involving the forging of Hitler's diaries, murder by hambone, and keeping a neighbour company during her bonking hour. Almodóvar directs throughout with splendid zip; all in all, the film's piquant look at high-rise life is far more cutting and funnier than his later box-office hits.Author: DT
Cast & crew
Director: Pedro Almodóvar
Producer: Tadeo Villalba
Cast: Carmen Maura, Luis Hostalot, Angel De Andres-López, Gonzalo Suarez, Verónica Forque full cast
Genre(s): Comedy
Duration: 101 mins
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