"The Room Next Door": Love and Death at the End of Capitalism

There is nobody like Pedro Almodovar. I would say that, with full bias, I am a fan of his works, I will never forget the first time I saw “Volver”, I love how he loves his women, the vibrant colour that dominates his screen, and when I walked into “The Room Next Door”, I had clear expectations,  and I was not disappointed.

“The Room Next Door” tells the stories of Martha, played by Tilda Swinton, who was bedridden by cancer, and her old friend Ingrid, played by Julianne Moore. They were friends and colleagues in New York back in the 80s, sharing the same lover, young and idealistic, before life took them in two different directions: Martha became a war correspondent, and Ingrid became a famous writer (whose latest book, which is  reiterated  several time throughout the film, discusses own  her fear of death). Then they found each other again in the present, and Martha came to Ingrid with a call for help: to accompany her in the last days of her life. Together, they will rent a house upstate, pretend to be on a vacation one last time, and then  Martha will take her euthanasia pill, ending her life with content  and dignity. She  needs Ingrid to be in the room next door when it happens.

I’ve been thinking a lot about death and life after watching this movie. A lot of reviews I read online emphasise the presence of death in this movie, and I agree: Death (with a capital D) is present in every single scene of this movie - they are waiting for Death to come, one is terrified of Death and one welcomes Death into her. Death also exists within the living: taking the forms of the past, of regrets, of the ghosts that forever haunt us, in memories and in the presence, and also in the incoming social collapse and climate crisis that Almodovar does  not hesitate to reference throughout the whole movie. But that is not all there is in this story. This is also a story of life and of hope. How much must you  love life to be in your  final days, cuddling up with your dear  friend, watching a Buster Keaton comedy, arms wrapped around each other? To find love in the face of death, to enjoy the sight of nature and talk about art, to reflect upon  the life you have lived, is a radical resistance but also radical acceptance of Death. I would argue that the film loves a lot more than its premise will let you believe. There is a character who shows up later in the movie (also played by Tilda Swinton), she is a ghost, a regret, but also, she is a sign of hope, a love that exists beyond the confines of life and death.

This is one of the first of Almodovar’s feature films that is in English, released after two shorts: “The Human Voice” (which also stars Tilda Swinton) and “Strange Way of Life” (one that I haven’t watched yet but I believe it has received quite negative reviews), and this language constraint is really glaring  in the movie. The usual  melodramatic, Spanish-speaking soap-opera dialogues, upon being translated to English, can come off as quite rigid and awkward for native  English speakers.  These dialogues are delivered by Swinton and Moore, two of the best actresses of their generation. However, we can still notice a certain stilted awkwardness. That was one of my biggest complaints about the  movie.

There is something that has bothered me since I watched this movie, that none of the reviews I have read have pointed out: it is the characteristics (or lack thereof) of the set designs. Like every Almodovar movie, the colour scheme is dominated by a red, lively tone, but at the same time, I cannot help but feel like something is missing: the set design, while so aesthetically pleasing, feels so empty of life. It looks too clean, never lived in, like a “clean girl aesthetic” Tiktok video (except if we replaced the beige with bright red), or just… a movie set. It  reminds me of his  short “The Human Voice”, which  is  set so obviously inside a soundstage, being destroyed as the story progresses (very Brechtian). This is what the set of  “The Room Next Door” made me think of,  how staged and ridiculous it is, its relationship with the characters, and how the setting contrasts with the vibrancy of all the scenes that took place in the characters’ memories. This is how Almodovar sees the modern world: how ridiculous, disastrous, fascistic, bland, formulaic, over-lit, cold it truly is.. It is a world where we have accepted the climate crisis and the triumphancy of  neoliberalism, a world that quite literally is an AirBnB for rent, a world that is less lively than an active war zone in the Middle East from one of Martha’s distant memories. But to live in this world, to accept love in our heart, to embrace the end and still find beauty in it, that’s a beautiful thing. The love the characters have for each other is contradictory, awkward, full of misunderstanding, but at the same time, it’s tender and passionate. It’s the act of being there for your dying friend, listening to her stories, offering to read her a book, and watching old movies together. It’s the connection they have that warms the story.

There is one scene that I remember from this movie: one of Martha’s memories, when she visited  the Middle East before a war, when everyone had left because of warnings, she visited two people who decided to stay and help the locals. It was later revealed that these two are likely each other’s gay lovers, and they loved each other more passionately than ever because they are willing to face death everyday. Love in the face of death -  I think that is my final conclusion of this movie.