Pedro Almodóvar is a Spanish director, his latest film The Room Next Door is about euthanasia, which has been legal in Spain since June 2021. However, Almodóvar’s first project in the English language took place in the USA. In the film, he sheds light on the struggle of not having the right to a dignified death. This is a global issue, people all around the world don’t have the right to choose, and their main obstacle towards gaining this right is other people feeling uncomfortable with the concept of death, this project attempts to make the audience question their own discomfort.
Vegetation and the color green are used as an indication of life and health, only showing up when Martha is feeling better and it’s mostly worn by Julianne Moore’s character. Once Martha and Ingrid enter the vacation house the audience witnesses a sequence in which the women are filmed from the outside, the crystal doors reflect the exterior nature over the profile of the pair. The Room Next Door reflects the purpose of the architecture, the house dictates that life remains outside its walls, as it is in fact the objective of the architecture to become the scene where Martha is to be separated from the life she has chosen to leave behind.
A notable object in the house is Hopper’s painting ‘People in the Sun’. It is a representation of the architectural environment, inside the home the great openings to natural light are unavoidable, a constant calling to the exterior. The house where The Room Next Door is filmed is named Casa Szoke and it was designed by Maria José Aranguren y José González Gallegos, it’s not in New York State, but in Madrid, and the trees are part of the forest of San Lorenzo de El Escorial. The house itself is a wonderful example of adaptation to context. The architecture embraces the steep ground and adapts to it by providing various angular viewpoints of the unique natural surroundings, the ideal environment for someone who desires to disappear. In the plan of the building, it can be appreciated how the architecture is shaped as combinations of trapeziums that collide into one another, allowing it to create openings for light in multiple directions. The variations in height between the blocks dictate the views of the natural environment, creating a cascading structure decorated using timber elements, resulting in an architecture that successfully accommodates into the form of the landscape.
Pedro Almodóvar’s other projects are known for having vibrant colors, in the interiors red and orange usually dominate the spaces. For Almodóvar, the colour Red represents sensuality and the vibrant passion that dominated the social liberation that filled Spain after the end of a 36-year-long dictatorship. In his other films red surrounds women who take control of their lives, however in The Room Next Door Martha does attempt to take control but instead of covering her in red, Almodovar slides a finite amount to demonstrate the limited control she can take over what is left of her life.
Almodóvar uses films as social commentary and in The Room Next Door he tells us that ‘There are many ways to live within a tragedy’, it is possible to coexist with a dying person, a military conflict, and a decaying world; humans adapt. The film is about ‘not looking away’ in the face of tragedy – as ‘we are witnesses of each other’s history’. Ingrid asks Martha if she can write about her, as it is through the act of storytelling that humanity prevails and it is only through learning from what we witness that progress can be achieved. Almodovar has used his talent to empower women and to question social norms, he is a master of depicting the human condition, and he does so by instrumentalizing the environments he designs, from the architectural scene to the shades of lipstick, Almodóvar curates thought-provoking stories through his characteristic composition, and The Room Next Door is no exception.
Álvaro is a Spanish architect with a keen focus on architectural journalism, he aims to inspire architects and architecture students through his writing to work towards a better future for everyone.
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