Penélope Cruz, Oscar nominee: “I believe in the maternal instinct, although I have friends who will never have it”

The idyll of Penelope Cruz with the Oscars. In 2006 she was nominated for Best Actress for Pedro Almodóvar’s “Volver”, although she won Helen Mirren for “La Reina”. In 2008 and 2009 she was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for “Vicky Cristina Barcelona” and “Nine”, respectively (and she won for the former). And now she has once again been nominated for Best Actress thanks to “Madres paralleles”, a film in which she is once again directed by her compatriot Almodóvar.

What is new for Penelope in this adventure is her motherhood, both on and off screen. Because she, at 47 years old, not only does she play a woman who has just given birth, but in her private life it will be the first time that she competes in the Academy as a mother of two children: An 11-year-old boy and an 8-year-old girl, both born from her relationship with Javier Bardem (also nominated for this year’s Oscar for Best Actor for “Being the Ricardos”). Everything stays in the family.

And although “Parallel Mothers” is a film that questions the concept of maternal instinct in its most traditional form, Penélope Cruz affirms with total conviction that she possesses it. . I can also understand that. Only that in my case I live it with intensity.

Along these lines, Penelope highlights Almodóvar’s ability to portray different types of mothers in his film: one devoted and passionate, another questioning her limits and her freedom, and one rather confused by her youth. “Pedro manages to portray motherhood from very particular and different places, but he does it without judging any of those versions. It is impossible for him to judge his characters, to put any kind of label on them. And I identify a lot with that”.

The other “parallel mother” in Almodóvar’s film is the young actress Milena Smith. She is 25 years old, but plays a pregnant teenager. Thanks to her role, she has been nominated for the Goya Awards for the second time –which will be delivered this Saturday–, and she already seems to be consolidated as one of the acting talents with the greatest projection in Spanish cinema.

Unlike Penelope, Smit isn’t a real-life mother, so we asked her how she prepared for the role. “It has been an incredible challenge and one of the most difficult. […] At first I was a bit lost, but one of the things that helped me the most was talking a lot with Penelope and Aitana. [Sánchez-Gijón]”, says Smit.

“I also talked a lot with a midwife -reveals the actress-. I asked her all kinds of questions I could think of, and above all I was very curious to know what it is like to give birth to a teenager. Because it is not the same situation, nor the same body, nor the same conditions. I remember that she even told me about girls who arrived when they were 12 years old, and they were traumatic situations. Then I also built my character from fear. From the ‘I can’t’”.

“Parallel Mothers”, which will be released on Netflix on Friday, February 18, is not only a movie about being a mother, but about femininity, pain and even historical memory, since it has a plot plan related to the disappeared in the Spanish Civil War. Certainly, all that political part is perhaps the weakest part of the film, the one that seems to hang from the script. But that does not stop it from being an appreciable film within Almodóvar’s filmography.

Much more solid and successful is the intimate drama embodied in the mothers played by Cruz and Smit, an issue that the Spanish director approaches with the sensitivity that we already know him: a always intense and unprejudicedand that in its best passages even seems indebted to Hitchcock’s “Vertigo”, due to its disputed identities, its women in crisis and some other winks.

“I hadn’t thought of it that way, but I love it,” Almodóvar replies when asked about that Hitchcockian aura. That there is a trace of Hitchcock in any of my films will always be welcome. Because for me cinema was Hitchcock. he is the great teacher. And, indeed, the film speaks among other things about the identity”.

“Who I had thought of is an author very dear to Hitchcock, who is Patricia Highsmith. When the reunion between the characters of Penelope and Milena occurs, there is a typical Highsmith situation. And from there, an entire area of ​​the film begins that is a ‘thriller’, with suspense”, adds the 72-year-old filmmaker, who seems to have found the ideal rhythm to continue growing his prolific career. His next project, which will star Australian Cate Blanchett, will be an adaptation of the acclaimed book “A Manual for Cleaning Women” by Lucia Berlin. How to keep expectations high.

• “Parallel Mothers” premieres on Netflix on Friday, February 18.