All About My Mother (1999)

IMDb plot summary: Young Esteban wants to become a writer and also to discover the identity of his second mother, a trans woman, carefully concealed by his mother Manuela.
Directed by Pedro Almodóvar. Starring Cecilia Roth, Marisa Paredes, Candela Peña, and Antonia San Juan.

As I've been watching a LOT of Almodovar, I reach this one, which one the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film as well as being his #1 film on Flickchart. I hoped this would be my turning point in understanding his films, as this seems to be one of his more accessible, but... it isn't quite. I really appreciate a film with so many rich female characters (I LOVE that the first man credited on IMDb is a full seven spots down -- that like never happens), and I thought many of them had interesting moments in and of themselves, but as always I can't find his narrative throughline. What experience is he trying to convey? What questions is he trying to raise or answer about motherhood or female relationships or gender identity? No clue. It all feels engaging enough as it goes along but ultimately I can't find the heart of it. Were it not for the more grounded character of Manuela, the entire thing would have felt more like the sensationalized soap operas his other films conjure for me, but her groundedness just conveys a sense that *something* deeper is meant to be going on here and it's just whooshing past me.

How it entered my Flickchart:
All About My Mother > The Lion in Winter (2003)
All About My Mother < Hairspray Live!
All About My Mother < Nick of Time
All About My Mother > Beverly Hills Cop
All About My Mother > The Texas Chain Saw Massacre
All About My Mother > A Man Escaped
All About My Mother < The Killing of a Sacred Deer
All About My Mother < At First Sight
All About My Mother < The Sound of Music
All About My Mother < Never a Dull Moment
All About My Mother < The Miracle Worker
All About My Mother > Quiz Show
Final spot: #1233 out of 3159.