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100Almodovar is adept at weaving together strands you'd never guess would match.
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100The year's best foreign-language movie an absolute must-see.
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100Almodóvar's masterwork, is a spectacular synthesis of everything that has always interested him -- proud women, lovely boys, beautiful drag queens, grand movie stars, gorgeous frocks, wild wallpaper .
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100Brimming with bittersweet wit and emotion and built with deceptively fluent craft.
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90The most heartfelt tribute to women -- specifically, actresses -- he's (Almodovar) ever made.
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90So intrinsically rich that it doesn't need any metaphors.
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90Just about everyone worth knowing in All About My Mother is female in spirit, which is to say they're all sexy, impossible, powerfully durable souls, quarrelsome and loyal, inventive at navigating the tragedies.
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90Pedro Almodovar's transfixing tragicomedy -- the best foreign movie of the year -- is also the best showcase for actresses in ages.
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90As straightforward and plot-driven as any movie about life imitating art imitating life could possibly be.
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90Funny and wise, lively and contemplative, intriguingly postmodern and powerfully moving, all at the same time. It's not to be missed.
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90A surprisingly satisfying combination of bawdy sexual humor, genuine emotion and a plot with mechanics so excessive that Almodóvar himself calls it "a screwball drama."
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It weaves life and art into a rich tapestry of love, loss and compassion.
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90This is humanism in drag: Almodovar's passionate redefinition of family values.
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90The most mature and satisfying work in a glittering, consistently surprising career.
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89It's filled with marvelous performances, fabulous wit, and some dizzying images.
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88The characters have a weight and reality, as if Almodovar has finally taken pity on them--has seen that although their plights may seem ludicrous, they're real enough to hurt. These are people who stand outside conventional life and its rules, and yet affirm them.
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Generous in spirit and always engaging as it demonstrates that no matter how difficult life may become, there's no excuse for being drab.
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88Some will find the movie's sexual antics too explicit and unconventional for comfort.
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88This is more than a movie: It's Almodovar's design for living.
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88Almodovar imbues his Harlequin-novel-meets-Marvel-comic-book melodramas with something more than a wink and a smile, and it's beguiling.
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88A tender genuflection to the women's energies that keep that spinning world from keeling over.
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88Almodovar still populates his work with characters you'll see nowhere else in movies.
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83As dark as a Greek tragedy yet it has a vibrance and joie de vivre that can't be contained by grief.
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80The unfettered comedy of life bubbling up from the Spanish unconscious continues to be proudly liberationist, gloriously extreme, and achingly human.
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80Even though the film is full of laughs, the jokes hover on the edge of the abyss: This is a world in which lurid colors and extravagant gestures are means of filling the void.
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80An emotionally satisfying and brilliantly played take on the ups and (mostly) downs of a group of less-than-typical female friends.
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80It's enough to make your head spin, but Almodovar, whose mastery of the medium has never been more assured, gives you plenty to think about, ultimately grounding the dizzy whirl of his idiosyncratic fictional world in a story that feels not just true but universal.
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80For me it felt like a good many weeks at a politically correct summer camp, though the talented actors--including Cecilia Roth, Eloy Azorin, Marisa Paredes, Toni Canto, Antonia San Juan, and Penelope Cruz--certainly seem to enjoy the taste of the characters they're playing.
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75No one else makes movies like this Spanish director.
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75Almodovar has created an ecstatic homage to the women who have inspired him all his life.
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75Emerges as a thoughtful reflection on the many roles women must play throughout their lives.
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70Classic melodrama given a thoroughly modern, utterly Almodovarian face-lift.
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63The work of a talented filmmaker coasting on his own fumes.
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63Mothers definitely get their due here: Birth mothers, adoptive mothers and mothers-to-be - with the only men in sight (save for one young fatality and one old eccentric) being those who wear flashy makeup and sport breasts
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LuisG.10Honest bittersweet portrayal of life’s experiences from an assertive woman’s perspective. Love, loss and friendship. Beautiful and life affirming.