Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown

Unrated

9/23/19881h 28m

Premiere Release (US)

~ A comedy about someone you know. ~

Overview:

Pepa resolves to kill herself with a batch of sleeping-pill-laced gazpacho after her lover leaves her. Fortunately, she is interrupted by a deliciously chaotic series of events.

Director:

Pedro Almodóvar

Status:

Released

Language:

Spanish

Buget:

$700,000.00

Revenue:

$14,979,298.00

Key words:

infidelity
friendship
airport
madrid, spain
suicide attempt
pregnancy
female friendship
slapstick comedy
female protagonist
terrorism
relationship
nervous breakdown
ex-wife
mental health
sleeping pill
lies
independent film
apartment
actress
frustration

Cast

Carmen Maura

~ as ~

Pepa

Antonio Banderas

~ as ~

Carlos

Julieta Serrano

~ as ~

Lucía

María Barranco

~ as ~

Candela

Rossy de Palma

~ as ~

Marisa

Kiti Mánver

~ as ~

Paulina Morales

Guillermo Montesinos

~ as ~

Taxi Driver

Chus Lampreave

~ as ~

Jehovah's Witness Goalkeeper

Eduardo Calvo

~ as ~

Lucía's Father

Loles León

~ as ~

Secretary

View full cast & crew

Reviews (1)

CinemaSerf
Written 1 year(s) ago
7
"I was a virgin this morning, but I'm not sure now...". Well after ninety minutes of these shenanigans, I'm surprised she was even certain about the morning. The story follows actress "Pepa" (Carmen Maura) who is despondent after being left by boyfriend "Iván" (Fernando Guillén). Determined to find out why, and pregnant, she contacts his former wife "Lucia" (Julieta Serrano), herself fresh from a lengthy stint in a sanatorium and living with her rather geeky looking twenty-something son "Carlos" (Antonio Banderas) but they can't really shed much light on his behaviour either. Whilst all this is going on, a group of terrorists is believed to have carried out an atrocity in Madrid and it might be that her best friend "Candela" (Marisa Barranco) could be mixed up as she had them stay in her apartment for an evening of furious jogging - so now she's in hiding. With the media and the cops on the trail of the killers, Pedro Almodóvar now crams enough slapstick comedy into this to rival anything Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau ever did. There's nothing nor anybody left out - even a bleach blond gay guy and some ridiculous high heeled antics to keep the pace rocketing along til a denouement that closes the story, but that hardly matters. This is about the characters and both Maura and and Barranco are on entertaining form delivering a pithy and humorous script as the plot lurches from the daft to the dafter. Well worth a watch this.