Notas Críticas

Gloria, un ama de casa frustrada, malcasada y adicta a las anfetaminas, vive en una casa de vecinos de un barrio humilde con su marido, que es taxista, sus hijos y su suegra. Compagina las labores del hogar con el trabajo de asistenta en otras casas. FILMAFFINITY

"Un guión genial, ácida radiografía de las existencias que laten a pie de asfalto" Luis Martínez: Diario El País

Crítica da época

'What Have I Done' Depicts A Funny, Unfamiliar Spain 

''What Have I done to Deserve This?'' is an absolutely wonderful black comedy about a Spain few foreigners ever see - and, for that matter, not all Spaniards, since over the last five years or so Spanish mores have been changing at a dizzying speed.

The film, which plays tonight and Sunday at the museum of Modern Art, wastes no time in letting us know that a new age has dawned. In the opening scene, Gloria (Carmen Maura), an attractive young cleaning woman, is going about her work in a Madrid kendo academy when a naked man beckons to her from the shower room. Unable to resist, in a trancelike state, fully dressed, she joins him for a heated session of desire under the shower. In the hands of a lesser director than Pedro Almodovar, or above all of a lesser actress than the extraordinary Miss Maura, the scene could have been simply squalid. In fact, it is funny, sad, realistic and touching all at the same time - as is the entire movie.

Gloria lives in a small apartment in one of the low-income housing projects that ring Madrid. She is addicted to ''speed'' to get her through her 18-hour days. Her 14-year-old son, Toni, sells heroin so he can take his grandmother back to the country. Her 12-year-old son, Miguel, seems to enjoy sexual relations with older men, so Gloria sells him to a homosexual dentist. Her next door neighbor, Cristal, is a Barbie Doll like prostitute with dreams of a career in Las Vegas, presumable in the same line of work. We first meet Cristal when she comes to borrow a whip to entertain a client.

Antonio, Gloria's swine of a husband, has dreams of his own. A taxi driver, he was once the chauffeur of a woman who was a famous singer in Germany. Ah! The great times! He carries her picture in his wallet until one day, out of sheer frustration, his wife whops him one with a ham bone and kills him, after which she cooks the ham bone.

''What Have I Done to Deserve This?'' has something of the dark comedies of Bunuel, Berlanga and Italy's Mario Bellocchio, but its flavor is really all its own. And Carmen maura is Mr. Almodovar's secret weapon: grave, put upon, curious funny, Woman Outraged, she carries the whole picture.

If ''What Have I done to Deserve This?'' is a feminist tract, it is the wittiest and most endearing one ever created. It is quite simply a small masterpiece.

By RICHARD GRENIER. MARCH 30, 1985 NYTIMES

Pedro Almodovar e Carmen Maura

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