badeducation

SYNOPSIS - BAD EDUCATION
Gay director Pedro Almodóvar's latest
film is not only his gayest, it's one of
our favorites and stars hunky Gael
Garcia Bernal (Y Tu Mama Tambien),
who portrays three gay characters!

REVIEW
In a pair of (or trio, depending on how
you view it) of tour-de-force
performances, Gael Garcia Bernal (Y
Tu Mamá También) stars as Juan, an
actor; Ángel, his gay alter-ego; and as
Zahar, his drag persona in Pedro
Almodóvar's gayest film yet. Though
never explicit, homoeroticism reigns
supreme in this eminently watchable
film about a young man whose life has
been shattered by a pedophile priest.
Exhibiting all of the trademarks of a
classic Almodóvar film, Bad Education
jumps around in different time frames,
has a mystery (or two or three) and is
highly stylized — where this film
departs is that all three lead
characters are queer men, not women.

The film opens in 1980 where a young,
succesful, gay Madrid director Enrique
is looking through the tabloids for a
story for his new film when his old
school friend Ignacio Rodríguez walks
in the door. Enrique remembers his
friend perfectly as he was his first love,
but he doesn’t recognize this man.
Ignacio bears a story called "The Visit"
that tells of the traumatic events at the
Catholic boys school they both
attended. The story was inspired by
their childhood at school, their
problems with a pedophile priest
Father Manolo. The story also tells of
their mutual discovery of cinema, love
of football and each other.

There's plenty of eye candy in this
superb creation from Almodóvar: not
only is Bernal a hunk, but the actor
portraying Enrique is also quite hot.
BTW, there is no full frontal nudity in
this NC-17 rated film — there's some
racy gay stuff, it's just not totally naked.

With two parallel story lines, time and
character may become confused for
the casual viewer. We advise you to
stick with it, Bad Education wasn't at all
bad for us. (Spanish with English
subtitles)

Scott Cranin