Hark and rejoice: the first snapshot of Pedro Almodovar's latest film is finally available. Featuring a brooding Tilda Swinton and Julianne Moore, The Room Next Door is one of the most hotly anticipated entrants appearing in Venice Film Festival 2024. After hungering for our next Almodovar fix, we didn't have to wait much longer. Sony Pictures Classics dropped a teaser trailer for the film, which coincidentally marks Almodóvar’s first English-language feature set to premiere in competition at Venice Film Festival on Sept. 2.
The Room Next Door is Almodóvar’s follow-up to 2021’s Parallel Mothers, which also screened at Venice and secured the fest’s best actress Volpi Cup for Penelope Cruz’s performance. The film is among a cherrypicked competition lineup at this year’s Venice Film Festival, which includes Luca Guadagnino’s Queer, Pablo Larrain’s Maria and Todd Phillips’ Joker: Folie à Deux.
What is the movie about?
The Room Next Door follows the lives of Ingrid (Moore) and Martha (Swinton), who were close friends in their youth when they worked at the same magazine. (Oh, the fruits we reap and know so well). Martha takes the cast of a flawed mother working as a war reporter. Where Ingrid opted to start a novelist's career in autofiction, their lives intersect again in an absurdly sweet moment. The trailer tells us as much: the two women cohabit a home, with Ingrid taking the role of Martha's carer. In one shot, she attends to a deathly pale Martha in a hospital bed. In another, Martha is puckering up to paint her lips coral red. The rest is up to our speculation, and knowing Almodovar, it could be anyone's game.
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When will the movie release to the public?
After it premieres in Venice, The Room Next Door will drop in theatres Dec. 20 from Sony Pictures Classics.
Where can I watch the trailer?
You can take your first look at the movie, below.
