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Almodovar returns to his roots in this smart gay melodrama Pedro Almodovar always delivers interesting movies, and Bad Education is certainly no exception, and while this movie didn't grab me as much as some of his earlier works, I still found it an interesting and quite rewarding cinematic experience. The Spanish director's confounded honesty and his willingness to approach unconventional sexuality is often a welcome change from the traditional Hollywood fare. Bad Education is a heady mixture of classic film-noir, seventies retro, and dark, often-macabre humor, where the subversive themes of murder, catholic hypocrisy, seditious sex, and effects of lying are woven into a dense and multi-layered story. Switching effortlessly between different time frames, and using the technique of a film within a film, Almodovar gradually peels back layer-upon-layer of narrative to reveal a startlingly simple love story between two boyhood friends called Ignacio and Enrique. The two of them meet as boys at a Catholic school in Spain, and soon they are falling in love with the movies - and each other. Father Manolo, the head priest at the school (an absolutely wonderful Daniel Gimenez Cacho) - who has eyes for Ignacio and jealously wants him for himself - shatters their heavenly world when one night he catches them making furtive love together in the dormitory bathroom. Interspersed with this story is the unfolding of events in the 1980's where Enrique (Fele Martinez) is now a successful filmmaker living in Madrid, and is looking for new inspiration. One afternoon Ignacio, now a struggling actor (played with sexy bravado by Gael Garcia Bernal), turns up unannounced at his office with a script called The Visit, which tells of their childhood friendship and Ignacio's sexual abuse by Father Manolo. Enrique is intrigued by the concept of The Visit, and later that night, as he reads it, the viewers see images of the film he is producing from it play out on the screen. Soon the shadowy secrets, the tortured life of Father Manolo, as well as Ignacio's identity, begin to unravel, well before Enrique decides to make The Visit into a movie. Blackmail, betrayal, and murder, all feature prominently, and the viewer is left to question and consider who is truly altruistic and who isn't, as the characters gradually take on different personas and no one appears as they first seemed. All the players give sturdy, provocative performances, particularly Bernal who has more than matched his strong role in the recent The Motorcycle Diaries. The film also has a wonderful sense of pacing, and the jumping back and forth through time periods - which could have become muddled and confused with a lesser director - is handled with a careful, and methodological thoroughness. Almodovar has offered up a scorching account of the Catholic Church, where the stultifying effects of sexual hypocrisy echo throughout one's life. He effectively lays their closeted, hypocritical, and deceitful ways on the table in a tart gay melodrama that has an exhilarating mix of murder mystery, sexual mayhem, and characters that you'll probably just love to hate. Mike Leonard December 04.