What Have I Done to Deserve This? (film)
| What Have I Done to Deserve This? | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Pedro Almodóvar |
| Produced by | Hervé Hachuel |
| Written by | Pedro Almodóvar |
| Starring |
Carmen Maura Ángel de Andrés López Verónica Forqué Gonzalo Suárez |
| Music by | Bernardo Bonezzi |
| Cinematography | Ángel L. Fernández |
| Edited by | José Salcedo |
Production company |
Kaktus Producciones Cinematográficas Tesauro S.A. |
| Distributed by | Cinevista (US) |
Release dates |
|
Running time | 101 minutes[1] |
| Country | Spain |
| Language |
Spanish German English French |
| Box office |
ESP 116,730,182[2] (USD$901,508) |
What Have I Done to Deserve This? (Spanish: ¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto?) is a 1984 Spanish comedy-drama film by Pedro Almodóvar. The title is sometimes given with an exclamation mark at the end rather than a question mark.
Almodóvar has described his fourth film as a homage to Italian neorealism, although this tribute also involves jokes about paedophilia, prostitution, and a telekinetic child. The film, set in the tower blocks around Madrid, depicts female frustration and family breakdown, echoing Jean-Luc Godard's Two or Three Things I Know About Her and strong story plots from Roald Dahl's Lamb to the slaughter and Truman Capote's A Day´s work but with Almodóvar's unique approach to filmmaking. Carmen Maura has often worked for Almodóvar, she became a synonym for a strong woman and also a gay icon for her role as a transsexual in Law of Desire.
Plot
The film is a slice of a housewife's life in 1980s post-Franco Madrid: Gloria lives in a small and cheap apartment with husband and two teenage children: the declared homosexual Miguel, whom she sells to the dentist, and the drug-dealing Toni. Her husband, Antonio, longs for a German woman for whom he was a chauffeur in Germany before he married Gloria.
Gloria's mother-in-law, a frugal and unhappy woman who hides her Magdalena cakes and desperately wants to move back to her native countryside, is another addition to Gloria's household. Cristal, a prostitute who lives next door, is Gloria's best friend.
When Gloria's husband assaults her in the kitchen, she accidentally kills him after hitting him with a ham leg. Her mother-in-law's lizard, Money, is the only witness to the crime. Gloria successfully evades the investigators and is never tied to the murder. There are many subplots intertwined with the main narrative with characters including a writer, his beauty-obsessed wife and an impotent policeman frustrated by his lack of sexual power.
Cast
- Carmen Maura as Gloria
- Ángel de Andrés López as Antonio
- Verónica Forqué as Cristal
- Gonzalo Suárez as Lucas Villalba
- Miguel Ángel Herranz as Miguel
- Juan Martínez as Toni
- Katia Loritz as Ingrid Müller
- Cecilia Roth as Woman in TV commercial
- Pedro Almodóvar as Playback 'La bien pagá'
- Tinín Almodóvar as Bank teller
- Chus Lampreave as Abuela, the mother-in-law
References
- ↑ "WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE THIS? (18)". British Board of Film Classification. 2 August 1989. Retrieved 8 July 2013.
- ↑ "What Have I Done to Deserve This? (1984) - Box office / business". Internet Movie Database. Amazon.com. Retrieved 8 July 2013.
External links
- What Have I Done to Deserve This? at the Internet Movie Database
- What Have I Done to Deserve This? at Rotten Tomatoes