In his first English language film, the Spanish writer/director Pedro Almodóvar presents a tale of friendship between two women as they together confront the near and expected death of one of the two.
The Room Next Door is based on What Are You Going Through, a novel by Sigrid Nunez. After many years apart the friends, Ingrid (Julianne Moore) and Martha (Tilda Swinton), have only recently reunited around the terminal illness of Martha.
A plan agreed to by both takes them to a country house where Martha will within weeks choose to end her life in the company of Ingrid. Ingrid cares for her friend, and reluctantly agrees to be with her in the final days of her life, juggling her own grief and discomfort with the need to support and to understand Martha’s plan to end her pain and sickness before she loses control of her own life.
The title of the film comes from the arrangement of the rooms where Martha and Ingrid will each sleep. The open door to Martha’s room indicates her continued existence; the door when closed tells Ingrid that Martha has chosen to end her life.
It’s interesting that Almodóvar’s first English language film is full of talk between two people, both professional writers. Ingrid writes fiction and Martha is a news correspondent. There is little change of scenery, as most of the film takes place in an angular glass house surrounded by secluded forest, a natural setting for a quiet death.
The lack of hysteria in what is a tragic condition seems to extend to the audience a rare opportunity to see planned death in a thoughtful and quiet way.”
Moore and Swinton play unusual characters, all too rare in contemporary movies. They discuss personal histories, including a shared love (portrayed by John Turturro) and estranged family members (including Swinton in an end-of-film dual role as Martha’s daughter Michelle).
Moore plays her part beautifully, moving back and forth between caution and self-control in her speech and emotional responses to Swinton’s careful, almost sweet, portrayal of a woman in exhausting pain and fatigue.
Swinton’s performance is surprising—so different from the edgy, often cold and rigid acting of her other films. Here she is presented as not so tall (perhaps Moore is standing on boxes), thoughtful, and quietly suffering her fate.
Both characterizations are very controlled, almost dry, and the almost non-stop dialogue says much without any excess emotion—intelligent, but almost academic. Almodóvar’s words (perhaps as a result of writing in his non-native language?) sometimes seem stiff or unnatural. The very red lipstick on the mouths of both actors emphasizes the power of speech here.
The Room Next Door presents friendship during a critical and fatal illness, and the lack of hysteria in what is a tragic condition seems to extend to the audience a rare opportunity to see planned death in a thoughtful and quiet way.
Almodóvar opens the viewer to consider a special way to be a friend, and a special way to live your final days.
Editor’s Note: The Room Next Door is now playing at The SLO Film Center at the Palm Theatre.