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 Volver review
  
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Onscreen, three generations of actresses play off of each other, offering an amusing feminist celebration. Carmen Maura and Pénélope Cruz return for a captivating cinematic reunion with the Spanish director who employed them respectively in Pepi, Luci, Bom and All About My Mother. Fortunately, as the film signals his return. "Volver" means "to return", following the example of the dead mother (Maura) who reappears suddenly in the chaotic existence of her two daughters. It wouldn't take much for Volver to be a ghost film if it didn't veer instead towards an intimate drama. Almodovar returns to haunt the region of La Mancha, a return to childhood roots for a film that works at different narrative levels. First of all as an homage: Pénélope Cruz, sensually radiates in the film in all her glory. Almodovar makes her a new Sophia Loren, mixed with a little Anna Magnani. A brave mother, the heroine invents an existence in conformity with her personality as a fighter, regardless of the immoral paths she must take. Volver is, in addition and especially, a film on mother/daughter relationships. The director's films abound with this conflictive topic. There again, they're about acts of forgiveness and reconciliation with one's roots. Volver functions as a transparent self-portrait with less density than Bad Education, and it doesn't have the breadth of his past productions. Not very spirited, the film is plagued with rather lazy writing and an unsurprising mise en scene. The limpid secret, part of the title of one of Almodovar's most beautiful films, is revealed. Translated into English by Anji Milanovic 
 The Skin I Live In
Broken Embraces
Bad Education
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