Dark Habits Movie Review

Director Pedro Almodovar simmered in Madrid for a full decade while doing extra film jobs, making Super 8 movies and working for the telephone company. He made eleven movies between 1980 and 1995, of which 1986's Matador is the fifth and 1984's Dark Habits is the third. Dark Habits is the work of a still maturing artist. Sexual obsession is one thing, but Catholicism is a far more primal target for satire. The film gets free mileage out of nuns on acid, nuns shooting up, and nuns sniffing cocaine, plus the lesbian mother superior who must finance all these activities, not to mention their pet tiger's food expenses. Underneath all these absurdities, the story line is straightforward, as are most of Almodovar's plots. Dark Habits is one long joke, not too far removed from the playground fantasies of parochial schoolchildren, but it is basically a warm-up for the far more ambitious projects Almodovar was yet to make. His fourth and sixth films, 1985's What Have I Done to Deserve This? and 1986's Law of Desire, both starred the legendary Carmen Maura. AKA: Entre Tinieblas.

1984 116m/C SP Carmen Maura, Christina Pascual, Julieta Serrano, Marisa Paredes; D: Pedro Almodovar; W: Pedro Almodovar; C: Angel Luis Fernandez. VHS, LV, Letterbox