Rewritings of male desire in the western of almodóvarian cinema

Abstract

This work addresses Strange Way of Life (Pedro Almodóvar, 2023) as an operation of rewriting the classic western based on the reformulation of male desire. It is therefore based on the tradition of gender, historically articulated around a hegemonic masculinity, based on law, force and violence to understand how Almodóvar displaces these codes to build a story based on the intimacy and vulnerability of the male protagonists. To this end, the contrast between exterior/interior space is studied as the main discursive element that backbones the deconstruction of gender. In this sense, the outer space, associated with conquest and action, is reinscribed as a place of introspection, while the domestic sphere privileges an ethics of care among men. Therefore, the film does not limit itself to introducing a homoerotic dimension into the genre, but also operates a reconfiguration of its discursive matrices, inscribing itself in a queer sensibility that questions normative models of masculinity and proposes new forms of subjectivity.