How do you feel about death? Do you think about it at all? Do you fear it? Are you feelings of mortality the same from when you were twenty or turned thirty years old? I kept thinking about my own personal feelings of “the end” all throughout Pedro Almodóvar’s The Room Next Door, an exquisite confrontation of one woman’s passing. I was fortunate enough to attend a public screening of Pedro Almodóvar’s first English-language feature film, The Room Next Door, while attending this year’s TIFF celebrations, but it hit me so hard that I have had trouble articulating how I feel about it. The more I think about it, the more it twists in my brain, but its honesty has come roaring up to the front of my psyche. It’s a stunner.
Julianne Moore’s Ingrid is signing books at a New York City bookshop when she learns that her friend, Martha, is battling cancer. They haven’t seen each other in years, but Ingrid immediately runs to Martha’s side, and their friendship picks back up instantly. Even though Martha’s cervical cancer is serious, she is optimistic of the experimental treatment, and she speaks rather casually about death even though she knows that Ingrid has an intense fear of it.
Even if she hasn’t witnessed it directly, Martha may have felt its presence as a former war correspondent. Rather than let death come to Martha, she takes one step forward when she purchases a euthanasia pill on the dark web, and she asks Ingrid if she will be by her side when she decides to take it. They will find a remote place (somewhere where Martha won’t be surrounded by her own belongings or memories) and every night she will leave her bedroom door open. When Ingrid wakes up and Martha’s door is closed, she will know that Martha has made her decision. “I deserve a good death,” Martha says.
Seeing Swinton and Moore, two queens of cinema, inhabiting the same frame is almost overwhelming as these two women discuss the past, their individual fears, or even consider how they want to move on from this world. Almodóvar has given us a tremendously surreal gift in these honest conversations, and the director grants us permission to think of our own personal worries surrounding death with considerable care. Can Ingrid fully realize that Martha’s wish is to die with dignity and on her own terms? Will Martha’s decision assist Ingrid in her own acceptance of what is so uncertain?
Almodóvar is a master of words but the things that characters are afraid to say, especially from Ingrid’s point of view, are equally powerful. Swinton and Moore are perfectly matched together, and the many literary references to James Joyce or Hemingway reinforce how the mind and hearts can be transcribed to words on a page. There is an immortality to how the written word can represent our feelings but then live on in a completely different life whenever someone new discovers it.
It is no surprise that the design of The Room Next Door is heavenly. Bina Daigeler’s costume design is feverishly stylish but also connected with its characters. The greens, blues, purples, and, of course, the signature Almodóvar reds transport you to an entirely new plane. There is a scene where Swinton is relaxed on a green chaise while Moore is curled on a red one that I could be reading entirely too much into their mental stop-and-go of the entire situation.
The Room Next Door is a transfixing drama about the necessity of taking a journey together. It speaks to the enormity or life and the universality of leaving this world.
The Room Next Door is set to open in theaters in New York City and Los Angeles on December 20 with a wider release in the following weeks.
