Comparing every movie about two men in love set vaguely around farms to Brokeback Mountain feels like a cop out, but with Pedro Almodóvar’s latest English-language short Strange Way of Life, it’s impossible not to. The short is a clear reaction to his decision to turn it down almost 20 years ago—it’s mentioned every time Strange Way of Life comes up, be it in Q&As, reviews, or news stories. While Ang Lee’s interpretation of Annie Proulx’s short story was grounded and realistic, Almodóvar’s response is a dreamlike pastiche of spaghetti westerns and Sirkian melodrama less than the sum of its parts. Unfortunately for audience members eagerly awaiting another entry in the gay cowboy canon, this dog don’t hunt.
The movie follows the story of Silva (Pedro Pascal) and Sheriff Jake (Ethan Hawke), two desert-dwelling country boys in an indeterminate time period, 25 years after their fiery fling. Silva stops into the Sheriff’s office and sparks fly again; they talk for a while over dinner and it starts to get steamy. Almodóvar chooses to leave this part of their relationship to the imagination, ending the scene in a particularly frustrating fade-to-black before picking up the morning after, where they talk for a while again, this time about Silva’s youthful dream of living on a ranch with Jake. The real reason for Silva’s sudden reemergence in Jake’s life eventually becomes clear; Silva’s son is the prime suspect of the murder of Jake’s sister-in-law. The rest of the film follows their wrestling with this revelation, along with the lives they lead now and the boyish desire from their youth.
The script is uncharacteristically weak for Almodóvar, especially following his two previous features, 2019’s Pain and Glory and 2021’s Parallel Mothers, both of which were lauded for their writing. Strange Way of Life feels like a feature squashed into a short, resulting in a frankly shallow plot that would have benefitted from another hour of exploration. Parts of Ethan Hawke’s performance feel flat, but that’s not his fault—he’s not given much to work with.
Luckily, like all Almodóvar’s projects, Strange Way of Life has exceptionally striking visuals, which saves the film from being written off completely. His use of color is a highlight, recalling the chromatic brightness of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and Volver in particular.
The anachronistic costumes, conceived by Yves Saint Laurent creative director Anthony Vaccarello, feel gaudy and overwrought, even in a film clearly intended to play up the inherent campiness of the Western genre. The movie itself starts with a sweeping shot of an implacable western landscape, a bright red title saying “SAINT LAURENT by Anthony Vaccarello presents” overlaid on top, lending credence to the initial critiques from Cannes that the film comes across as a clothing ad. In the Q&A following the film, Almodóvar mentions Vaccarello initially coming to him with more authentic costuming ideas, but he pushed for more pop and less grit. Lucky for Vaccarello: he was able to shirk the blame for some truly odd clothing choices.
In a time where Generation Z is chastised for its prudishness and motion pictures are becoming more and more sexless, Pedro Almodóvar’s Strange Way of Life seemed like the perfect remedy. From a director known for eroticism, a gay cowboy movie promised to be salacious. But the end product was oddly chaste, a graven misstep for a film starring Pedro Pascal and Ethan Hawke at their hottest. When the credits roll, you’re only left wanting to rewatch Brokeback Mountain and Law of Desire.