Strange Way of Life

This was a promotional short by Saint Laurent, and that makes sense. It goes hand-in-hand with Almodovar's heightened, melodramatic style, so the fashionable cowboy cliches didn't mess with the verisimilitude of the story.

Unfortunately, the dialogue suffers from being absurdly expositional, and not in an intentionally comedic way. It's understandable at first, because it's a short, and you want to give it some slack for this, but then there's a flashback scene that goes on for 3 minutes longer than it needs to.

The acting by everyone besides Hawke and Pascal is very mid. Their characters had a really deep and interesting relationship that could have easily sustained a hundred minute flick, but with the time-constraints, that depth can't be explored well enough.

Could have been something genuinely great if this story was given the weight and space to breathe it deserves.

The ending is also rushed and just stops.

Several hundred people turned up at this one-night-only cinema screening and very, very few of us appreciated that is was only going to be half an hour long!! "Silva" (Pedro Pascal) rides half way across the desert to meet up with his old pal "Jake" (Ethan Hawke) who is the local sheriff. It's pretty clear from the get-go that there is a degree of personal baggage between the pair and that the true purpose of the visit is more than to relight old candles and have a good old reminisce... It's OK, this - nothing more. A testament to the drawing power of Almodóvar and Ethan Hawke to watch what is essentially a non-story that tells a little by way of flashback but for the most part just shows us a glimpse of something not especially interesting or unique. Looks good enough but I left a little disappointed and certainly underwhelmed.

'Strange way of life' is an English-speaking short film directed by one of the most prominent Spanish directors ever... who does not speak English. How (and why) this amateur piece of work with such bad writing, astoundingly dumb dialogues and even mediocre cinematography got produced and released theatrically is beyond me.

The story it's, most of the time, the same nonsensical exposition over and over. It hopes to trick the audience into believing there's a deep conflict, a sad story of tormented lovers and forbidden love, but there's none. The chemistry is just not there. The clumsy flashback scene is utterly ludicrous.

This film is something I would expect from a pretentious student at film school, a self-proclaimed artist who tries to write something deep just to show how smart they are, but fails because they don't know anything about it. However, it's not. It's a film by Pedro Almodóvar. Not worth the time, much less the cost of a full-length movie ticket.

Even the best of the best fails on their work occasionally, and Almodovar is not the exception, this short film, along The human voice may be festival-material, those shouldn't have come into commercial exhibition.

Strange way of life looks like a spaghetti western from the 50s, there are even a few clothing flaws, (like plastic buttoned shirts) that break its weak western-like atmosphere.

The human voice, although Tilda Swinton is a great actress, this one-voice performance is exhausting to watch, even for for just 30 minutes.

Just two short films with 70 minutes in total, spare your ticket, your time and your gasoline.

It's literally a short film. Only half an hour and the ending leaves you perplexed and wondering what is it the director wanted to say or is it just a window into the hidden love and lust of cowboys for each other in times past. The acting leaves alot to be desired and the plot I found to be overly simplistic. There are some scenes of passion especially the younger actors who in flashbacks of both the sheriff and this ex lover share their love and passion for each other in a wine drinking splashing rolling moment in the movie. Plus a very short sequence of the older ones in bed together after they have dinner. This short film reminded me of back mountain and thinking why this one too wasn't made into something on par in depth and sophistication with that. In one word it was disappointing.