The life of TV actress Pepa (Carmen Maura) is turned upside down when her lover, Iván (Fernando Guillén), leaves and avoids speaking to her. Before Pepa can sort out her life, she visited by a frantic Candela (María Barranco), who has found out that the men she has been staying with have been arrested as terrorists. Pepa also has to deal with a young couple, Carlos (Antonio Banderas) and Marisa (Rossy de Palma), who arrive at her apartment to rent it. What she doesn't know is that Carlos is Iván's son, and that his mother, Lucía (Julieta Serrano), has just been released from a mental hospital and plans to kill Iván for infidelity. When Marisa is knocked out by Pepa's spiked gazpacho, Carlos, unfaithful like his dad, starts to make out with Candela. Meanwhile, we discover that the absent Iván is leaving the country with his lawyer, Paulina (Kiti Manver).
In Pedro Almodóvar's breakthrough comedy, all the female characters share the same situation: they have been, are being (and will be?) betrayed by their men and are suspect to a nervous breakdown. Some, like Lucia, go mad, others, like Candela, have no idea what to do, while Pepa (a typical Almodóvar heroine) finds the inner strength to overcome her setback and to help others in the process.
The film's later scenes are foreshadowed by funny short clips near the beginning, such as in the condom advertisement that Candela acts in, and which Pepa dubs, and in the detergent advertisement where Pepa plays the mother of a gangster who washes her son's blood stained shirt just before the police barge into her house.
A lively riot of colour and movement, vivacious and warm-hearted in the end.
Spanish with English subtitles.
4 out of 5 stars.
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