Review 731: The Room Next Door

  

I don't know what made Pedro Almodovar cast Julianne Moore & Tilda Swinton in his English language debut, but the casting is inspired and they make a fantastic pair.

Based on the novel What Are You Going Through by Sigrid Nunez, Ingrid Parker (Julianne Moore) and Martha Hunt (Tilda Swinton) were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme, but strangely sweet, situation.

The Room Next Door is a film about Secrets and Lies of Friendship as well as the estrangement divides between parents and children. 

there's great use of reflections to make Martha appear ghostly. Almodovar loves the close-ups on Moore and Swinton's faces to help  As with most of Almodovar's films, it features and places heavy emphasis on rich warm colours helped by Edu Grau's gorgeous cinematography. The score by Albert Iglesias is beautiful, the production design is beautiful

The casting of both Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton is an inspired one. The contrast between Ingrid and Martha is very interesting to explore because whilst Ingrid fears death, Martha embraces it. She recognises that she doesn't have long to live and wants

John Turturro has a small and functional role playing Damian Cunnigham, a man whom both Ingrid and Martha respectively dated at some point in their lives.