Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown is a Spanish language comedy-drama film directed by Pedro Almodóvar. The movie follows Pepa (Carmen Maura), a voice-over actress, who is devastated after her lover Ivan (Fernando Guillén) abruptly breaks up with her through a phone call. In an impulsive act, she creates a batch of gazpacho soup laced with sleeping pills, intending to kill herself.
As Pepa tries to come to terms with her breakup, she is bombarded with a series of chaotic events that interrupt her suicide attempts. Her best friend Candela (María Barranco), who is also on the verge of a nervous breakdown, seeks her help as she claims to be hunted by the police for her involvement with a terrorist group. Meanwhile, a lawyer named Carlos (Antonio Banderas) comes looking for Ivan, unaware that he has left Pepa. The plot twists and turns as Pepa and Ivan's son, Carlos's mentally unstable wife, and Ivan's ex-wife Lucía (Julieta Serrano), add to the mayhem that unfolds.
The movie is set in Madrid and is a brilliant portrayal of the cultural mood in Spain in the early 1980s. The characters' interactions are filled with absurd humor, melodrama, and emotional intensity, which make for an entertaining watch. The film won a nomination for Best Foreign Language Film at the 1989 Academy Awards, among other accolades.
