The Room Next Door 2024

Ingrid and Martha were close friends in their youth, when they worked together at the same magazine. Ingrid went on to become an autofiction novelist while Martha became a war reporter, and they were separated by the circumstances of life. After years of being out of touch, they meet again in an extreme but strangely sweet situation.

Review

When this film won the Golden Lion for Pedro Almodóvar at the Venice film festival this summer, there were three kinds of surprised critic. Some were surprised to learn that this was Almodóvar’s first ever major European festival award; others that this should be the film to finally bag it … and then there were those who were politely surprised that it should have won anything at all. I myself found it as extravagant and engrossing and doggedly mysterious as anything he has done recently, with luxuriously self-aware performances from Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton, and an undertow of darkness often overlooked by yeasayers and naysayers.