Highly intertextual, referencing All About Eve, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Almodóvar’s own work, not to mention the form of the soap opera. Early shot in the kitchen highly reminiscent of Jeanne Dielman. The grainy photos on the facade of the theater anticipates the photographs in Almodóvar’s later Broken Embraces.
When Esteban gets hit by the car, slow-motion shot from his point of view as he falls and Manuela runs toward him. Further association with slow-motion and death.
See earlier post on this film for close reading on Manuela’s trip to Barcelona.