Extraña forma de vida

I remember watching the trailers for "A Strange Way of Life" months ago and very much anticipating this movie. I tracked the release through Spain and other countries before it came around to the United States.

Though the movie is a short film, it was very interesting to watch, however not enough gay scenes to even portray being gay in the old west. I may watch it again, however my expectations have been lowered at this point.

My recommendation? Definitely watch it as it is a good movie! I'm even thinking of watching it again - which shows how good the movie stands on its own. For those who are sensitive to gay drama and themes, you have nothing to worry about with this movie. Gay is insinuated, but not completely played-out.

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.

'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.

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.

Oh so very gay and well acted. I can absolutely see how this was Pedro Almodóvar seemingly long overdue version of Brokeback Mountain in a way, as referred to by both him and the fact that he wanted to direct Brokeback Mountain to begin with. Sadly I have still not yet watched that movie despite hearing nothing but fantastic things about it, and after watching this one I really don't think that Almodóvar would have had it in him to make something that widely well received.

I think this works best a short film, although at the same time I can't help but feel like it's far too short to really get much from it at all. What is there however is at the very least incredibly decent and has some really major highs, such as the spectacular acting from both leads (Pedro Pascal and Ethan Hawke), and what I consider to be a very good solid score that really elevated what was an otherwise mediocre time.

A story of two men who were lovers at one point 25 years ago in the past, meeting each other again after one of their sons commits a heinous crime in the others town. They immediately hit it off after not seeing each other for over two decades, and the little chemistry that is shown between the two with the very limited time we get with them is palpable and honestly very cute at times to say the least. But that doesn't really matter much when we barely get to spend any time with the two of them, so we barely get to explore their seemingly very detailed and interesting lives - which is what I think drags this down a great deal.

The weird thing is I don't believe this should be any longer either, I don't think it particularly works as well as it could've as a short film but at the same time I don't think even another thirty minutes of this would be all that appealing to me. It's a very conflicting thing as it clearly has some really good parts and is executed well by the actors themselves, but I cannot tell if it's the writing or the directing that makes it all feel just a tad lackluster.

Overall I liked it enough to consider it worth checking out, especially due to the fact it is only at a brisk thirty minute runtime. It's filled with two immensely talented actors being gay as hell and looking good doing it, which is at least enough of a reason for me to watch it. Nothing special if we're being honest, but it could for sure resonate with other people far more than it did with me. I slightly enjoyed what it was going for and I liked the execution of the majority of it, but it didn't really make a lasting impact on me. A perfectly serviceable short film that I think you should check out if you have Netflix as it just dropped on there.