What Have I Done to Deserve This? (1985)

Definitely Worth Watching

One reviewer has reassured me that I was not alone in one experience here. After I'd seen the whole thing, parts that didn't make sense came into focus. That's a very enjoyable experience. In between, it's manic and clever and just fun. It's very different from the usual Hollywood fare, and it's wonderful. June 16, 2008

Quirky Pedro Almodovar flick!

This is one of Pedro Almodovar's earlier efforts from the 1980's and it is weird and quirky and funny! I loved seeing it again after all these years!
[...] May 2, 2008

Una familia dysfunctionala

Black comedy doesn't necessarily have to be "about" anything in particular: it really just needs to express a certain cynicism (healthy or not) about contemporary life and culture. Pedro Almodovar's earliest films have often been described in such terms, but I'm not entirely sure that's correct. Absurdist, to be sure, skeptical--if not completely cynical--certainly, but even at his bleakest, there is a basically loving spirit on display. He shows genuine affection for his characters, even the ones who don't seem to actually deserve it (the chauvinistic husband in this film, for instance, is still shown as a basically principled and decent-in-his-way sort).

It may well be that Almodovar's affection for, as well as his compassion toward, his characters is what grounds his absurdist comedies and what serves to make them more "grey" than completely "black." I've read that he refuses to pronounce judgment on his characters, no matter what kind of trouble they create for themselves or others. One senses that much in this relatively early film (his first international success). Individual viewers may draw their own conclusions (as we all do in real life) about individual characters in the film. I find it a strong point, rather than a weak one, that different viewers will come away from this film with differing impressions of the dramatis personae.

One of Almodovar's favorite leading ladies Carmen Maura appears here as the harried working class housewife Gloria, who's struggling (pretty much in vain) to maintain her family and her dignity by working 18-hour days (the drudgery of "women's work" has seldom been more graphically displayed). Her husband and two sons are anything but supportive, each aware of Gloria's plight on some level but each choosing to remain demanding and difficult and capable of driving this particular woman towards a nervous break-down.

As readers of previous reviews may know, Gloria's husband is a taxi driver whose meagre earnings are not enough to support the family (although it may just be that he refuses to give his wife the money she needs to run the household, it's never made 100% clear). Her adolescent son is already pushing drugs and her pre-teen son is hustling older men. Theirs is a dysfunctional family with a capital "D."

The film's very absurdity would seem to guarantee that most viewers would NOT take its characters actions TOO seriously. But it is interesting to see how some reviewers have commented on Gloria's willingness to hand over her son to the "care" of an obvious pederast (his dentist, who promises him enough to eat and music lessons--to say nothing of free dental work--in exchange for, well, you know). That little plot twist, as well as the neighbor child's CARRIE-esque psychokinetic abilities should make it clear that we are entering the realm of the absurd here.

One of the most intriguing elements of Almodovar's work is his ability to create a zany alt-universe that has its own internal logic and sort of makes sense while we're viewing it. That's certainly the case with this early work (although I could have done without the psychokinesis myself, an effect which almost undermines the bizarro logic of the film). If Almodovar had never gone on to better things, this effort would be a fairly entertaining, quirky indie flick that might have some cult following. It probably would not have been required viewing in anyone's book, however. Given the significance of Pedro Almodovar's later work, though, it can certainly be considered essential viewing for scholars and admirers of the "bad boy" of Spanish cinema. February 23, 2008

Shocking

Is this for bloody real? This is one weird family. Almost like the real, modern day Addams Family. Granny charges her own son for water. Son is a chauvinistic pig. A family living above poverty but way below comfortable. Sadness hidden behind daily lives of the people next to us July 13, 2007

Another Jewel in Pedro Almodóvar's Crown!

Though the films by one of our geniuses of filmmaking in our times, Pedro Almodóvar, is making films now that are polished to perfection - Volver (2006), La Mala educación (2004), Hable con ella (2002), and Todo sobre mi madre (1999) - his early films such as this one '¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto!!' in retrospect contained all the identifying marks that would establish him as not only one of the bad boys of cinema, but also one of the sensitive cinematic psychologists. And everything he touches gleams.

In this 1984 story of a wildly dysfunctional family co-habiting in Madrid, the star is Gloria (Carmen Maura), a No-Doz addicted maid living in a tiny flat with her taxi driver/forger husband who perseverates on an aging German chanteuse for whom he once worked, two sons - one a hustler and the other a drug peddler - and a wacko mother-in-law who treats food like contraband, selling what she chooses to the family members. The turning point in this raucously fragile but funny family is the chance to make money: the father is coerced into forging Hitler's memoirs with a little help from his German chanteuse's influence,
Gloria bargains with a dentist for her hustler son's possession, ad infinitum!

But leave it to Almodóvar to pull it all off with just the right amount of madness and mayhem, and a jolly dollop of psychology about family interaction and women thrown in for good measure. The cast is a delight (including Almodóvar regulars Cecilia Roth and Verónica Forqué!) and the movie is so fast paced that it feels like a carnival ride - which is very much the way this marvelous director sees his early work. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, September 06 September 14, 2006

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