PARALLEL MOTHERS: ALMODÓVAR’S LATEST
Pedro Almodóvar is a master stylist and storyteller. As a longtime fan I am glad he is so prolific, because if one of his films doesn’t meet my (high) expectations I console myself with the knowledge that there is another one in the works. In less skillful hands, the ingredients of Parallel Mothers might result in a soap opera that would invite quibbles over credibility. But Almodóvar’s characters have inner lives; we empathize with them and that makes them real. Penélope Cruz plays a successful photographer who gives birth to a child without committing to a longterm relationship with the father. She befriends a younger woman who shares her hospital room immediately following the birth, and the two promise to stay in touch. Cruz cannot know that…
