The New York Times gave the film a rave review and chose it as her Critic’s pick of the week writing: “A great deal happens in “Pain and Glory,” just not ritualistically and not at top volume. Its agonies are tempered, its regrets hushed, its restraint powerful.”
Pain and Glory was named “The Best Movie of 2019.”
Time magazine named Pain and Glory as the best film of 2019.
Sight & Sound magazine named it the 6th-best film of the year.
The movie has been seen by some as an homage to the works of Paul Auster.
At one point, while Salvador is in a heroin-induced stupor, Alberto logs on to his computer. As the camera pans across the desktop screen, an icon entitled “Paul Auster” can be seen. The narrative structure and arc of the film, with its many coincidences (Federico stumbling upon the performance of the play; the discovery of Eduardo’s portrait of Salvador many years after it was painted) are like a visual depiction of an Auster novel.
In academic research, Shlomit Lir and Liat Ayalon wrote about the movie in relation to the myth of the absolute creator and of the danger of the process of regression into the world of creative arts, which is actualized in by the protagonist’s inability to overcome the residues of the past. According to the authors, the absolute director is so deeply involved in his work that he finds it difficult to speak any language other than cinema.
