Y tu mamá también (Spanish forAnd Your Mom Too)^[2][3][4][5] is a 2001 Mexicancoming-of-agecomedy dramaroad film^{[6][7][8][9][10]} directed byAlfonso Cuarón, who co-wrote the script with his brotherCarlos.^[1] It follows two teenage boys who take a road trip with a woman in her late twenties and starsDiego Luna,Gael García Bernal, andMaribel Verdú, with narration byDaniel Giménez Cacho. It is set in 1999 against the backdrop of Mexico's political and economic realities, specifically at the end of the uninterrupted seven decades of presidents from theInstitutional Revolutionary Party and the rise of the opposition led byVicente Fox.

Y tu mamá también
U.S. theatrical release poster
Directed by	Alfonso Cuarón
Written by	Alfonso Cuarón Carlos Cuarón
Produced by	Alfonso Cuarón Jorge Vergara
Starring	Maribel Verdú Gael García Bernal Diego Luna
Narrated by	Daniel Giménez Cacho
Cinematography	Emmanuel Lubezki
Edited by	Alex Rodríguez Alfonso Cuarón
Production company	Producciones Anhelo
Distributed by	20th Century Fox
Release date	June 8, 2001 (2001-06-08)
Running time	106 minutes[1]
Country	Mexico
Language	Spanish
Budget	$5 million
Box office	$33.6 million

In addition to directing and co-writing the film, Cuarón also produced it withJorge Vergara and edited it alongsideAlex Rodríguez. The film's explicit depiction of sex, nudity, and drug use caused complications in its rating. In Mexico, it earned $2.2 million its first weekend, setting a new record for the highest box office opening inMexican cinema.^[11][12] In 2002, it was released in English-speaking markets under its Spanish title, with a limited release in the United States.^[13] It received critical acclaim and was nominated forBest Original Screenplay at theAcademy Awards and asBest Foreign Language Film at theGolden Globe Awards. Since its release, it has been regarded as one of the best films of the 2000s and the 21st century.^[14][15]

The events, set inMexico in 1999, are punctuated by avoice-over,omniscient narrator who knows the characters' thoughts, history and future evolution.

Two teenage best friends, working-class Julio and upper-class Tenoch, graduate from high school and see their girlfriends off on a trip toItaly. Despite their vow to remain faithful to the girls, they intend otherwise. Their plans for fun, however, deteriorate and they spend time smoking pot, swimming in a country club and at one pointmasturbating together on diving boards.

During the fatuous wedding reception of Tenoch's older sister, they meet Luisa, the Spanish wife of Tenoch's cousin Jano. Trying to impress her, the boys describe a fictitious secluded beach calledBoca del Cielo ("Heaven's Mouth"), to which they invite her. Days later she visits a doctor for some test results, and receives adrunken call from Jano who tearfully confesses an infidelity. The next day, she takes Tenoch and Julio up on their invitation.

Even though Julio and Tenoch know it to be an aimless trip, the three set off and drive through rural Mexico. The teenagers talk about their friendship and, when asked by Luisa, boast about their sexual exploits. Luisa speaks of Jano and recalls her first love, who died in a motorcycle accident. During one of their stops, Luisa leaves a message on Jano's answering machine explaining that she has left him.

Throughout the trip, Luisa's extroverted and upbeat persona is interspersed by bouts of inconsolable crying, some of which are accidentally witnessed by the boys. On one of these occasions, Tenoch enters her motel room in search of shampoo, at which point she daubs her tears and seduces him. Julio witnesses them having sex and, upset, walks away. He later tells Tenoch he had sex with Tenoch's girlfriend, in violation of one of the rules governing their friendship. Tenoch spends the night furiously scolding Julio and asking for details.

Noticing tension the next day but still unaware of Julio's confession, Luisa has sex with him to "equalize" the boys' perceived status. A jealous Tenoch then reveals that he, too, has had sex with Julio's girlfriend, sparking a quarrel that nearly comes to blows. After being shoved away by Julio while trying to intervene, Luisa angrily berates their immaturity and sexual incompetence, dismisses their rivalry ascloseted homosexuality, and walks away. Shocked by her outburst, they beg her to stay, which she does in exchange for her own set of rules to keep them at bay.

They make camp near the sea and meet a localfishing family who boats them to an isolated beach, coincidentally calledBoca del Cielo. They relax and enjoy the ocean, but upon their return find their campsite ransacked by a herd of runaway pigs. They spend the night in a nearby village, where Luisa makes another phone call to Jano to bid him an affectionate but final farewell.

Luisa, Julio, and Tenoch get drunk that evening and joke about their sexual histories. Julio and Tenoch reveal that they have frequently had sex with each other's girlfriends, not just once as originally confessed. Julioadds that he had sex with Tenoch's mother, but it is unclear whether he is serious. The three dance together sensually and then retire to their room. As Luisa kneels and stimulates them both, Julio and Tenoch embrace and kiss each other passionately.

The next morning, the boys wake up naked together. They bolt from bed and express a sudden eagerness to return home. The narrator explains the subsequent events: the boys' journey back is quiet and uneventful, Luisa stays behind to explore nearby coves, the boys' girlfriends break up with them upon returning from Italy, and the erstwhile best friends stop hanging out.

A year later, after a chance encounter inMexico City, Julio and Tenoch go for coffee together. They awkwardly catch up on each other's lives and news of their mutual friends. Tenoch informs Julio that Luisa died of cancer a month after their trip, and that she had been aware of her prognosis during their entire road trip. Tenoch finds an excuse to leave, and despite the two agreeing to meet up again, the narrator reveals that this is the last they will see of each other.

Cuarón did not want to cast Luna for the role of Tenoch because he was a teen idol andtelenovela star in Mexico. García Bernal convinced Cuarón to hire Luna because their friendship would make the performance of their characters' friendship much easier. Cuarón ultimately hired Luna because he became convinced that their bond would produce a natural and honest performance.^[16]

After working onGreat Expectations andA Little Princess,Alfonso Cuarón envisioned a film that was not influenced by production techniques used in Hollywood cinema. Cuarón wanted to reject commercial production techniques he had used in his previous films, like dollies, close-ups, and dissolves. Instead he embraced a documentary-realist style of filmmaking forY tu mamá también.^[11] Before making the film, Cuarón had worked for some time in Hollywood, prior to return to his roots in Mexican cinema.^[17] In an interview, Cuarón said: "I wanted to make the film I was going to make before I went to film school, ...a film in Spanish, and a road movie involving a journey to the beach."^[17]

Additionally, Cuarón has citedAdieu Philippine, a 1962French New Wave film, as a crucial inspiration forY tu mamá también. Overlaps include a road trip featuring a love triangle, wide shots of a car curving down a road, an omniscient narrator, and a character dancing while staring into the camera.

InY tu mamá también, Alfonso Cuarón reimagined the Americanroad movie genre to depict Mexico's geography, politics, people, and culture.^[11] Cuarón wanted to use the road-film genre to challenge mid-20th century Latin-American Cinema movements that rejected the pleasure and entertainment typical of Hollywood commercial cinema created by using fictional characters and story.^[18] Cuarón aimed to only borrow the pleasure and entertainment of Hollywood cinema to synthesize with political and cultural exploration of Mexico.^[18] Using fictional characters and a story within the documentary-realist style, Cuarón was able to explore Mexico's geographical, cultural, and political landscapes.^[18]

The director and screenwriter were not afraid of developingY tu mamá también during the production process.^[17] Cuarón's script was minimal and unelaborate so the actors could contribute to its development during the rehearsal process.^[17] Throughout the film the actors improvised.^[18] Instead of using high-tech equipment, the entire film was shot with a handheld camera to create a documentary-realist look that mimicked candid footage. In an interview, Cuarón said it all went "back to our original idea of 15 years ago, in which we would do a low-budget road movie that would allow us to go with some young actors and semi-improvise scenes and have a bare storyline but not be afraid of adding things as we went."^[17]

The beach scenes in the film were shot near the resort Bahías deHuatulco inOaxaca.^[19][20]

Y tu mamá también was produced by Anhelo Producciones, a company co-founded by Cuarón andJorge Vergara, a well-known Mexican businessman and the film's producer. The company provided sufficient funding to make the film and launch an impressive marketing campaign. The $5 million film budget was substantial by Mexican film standards. Advertisement and publicity appeared across Mexico. Along with the help of Anhelo Producciones, the ratings board controversy gave the film a lot of free publicity in Mexico.^[11] On location production support was provided by Alianza Films International.

20th Century Fox acquired the film's distribution rights for Latin America, Germany, Switzerland, Italy and France.^[21] Shortly after the Mexican release,IFC Films acquired North American distribution rights to the film.^[13]

Y tu mamá también was released in the United States onDVD in an unrated version in 2002 byMGM Home Entertainment.^[22] In 2014, it received aBlu-ray release as part ofThe Criterion Collection.^[23]

A box office success both domestically and abroad,^[24]Y tu mamá también grossed $2.2 million in its first week, breaking Mexico's box office records for domestic films. It went on to gross a record $12 million in Mexico.^[25]

The film became a global success after its distribution by U.S. independent companiesGood Machine andIFC Films. The film grossed $13.8 million in the US and Canada, making it the second-highest grossing Spanish language film in the United States at the time,^[26] and poised Bernal for crossover success into American markets^[27] (Bernal's 2004 performance inThe Motorcycle Diaries would go on to break this record). It grossed $33.6 million worldwide.^[12]

Critically,Y tu mamá también received acclaim upon its original release. The review aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes reported that 90% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based upon a sample of 192, and an average rating of 8.10/10. The website's critical consensus states, "Led by a triumvirate of terrific performances, Alfonso Cuarón's free-spirited road trip through Mexico is a sexy and wistful hymn to the fleetingness of youth".^[28] OnMetacritic, the film received anaverage score of 89 out of 100 based on 36 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".^[29]Roger Ebert gave the film four stars out of four, saying, "Beneath the carefree road movie that the movie is happy to advertise is a more serious level—and below that, a dead serious level."^[30]

Y tu mamá también won the Best Screenplay Award at theVenice Film Festival.^[31] It was also a runner-up at theNational Society of Film Critics Awards for Best Picture and Best Director^[32] and earned a nomination for Best Original Screenplay at the 2003Academy Awards.^[33] The film made its US premiere at theHawaii International Film Festival.^[34]

The film was released without a rating in the US because a market-limitingNC-17 was unavoidable.^[35] TheMPAA's presumed treatment of the film based on the graphic depiction of sex, nudity and drug use in comparison to its much more accepting standards regarding violence, prompted critic Roger Ebert to question why movie industry professionals were not outraged: "Why do serious film people not rise up in rage and tear down the rating system that infantilizes their work?"^[30]

In 2001, Alfonso and Carlos Cuarón sued the Mexican Directorate of Radio, Television, and Cinema (RTC) for the film's 18+ rating (A grade ‘C’ certificate from the RTC), which they considered illegal political censorship. They took legal action to expose the government-controlled ratings board, prompting its transformation into an autonomous organization free of government involvement and political influence. The 18+ rating was administered for strong sexual content, nudity involving teens, drug use, and explicit language, and prevented audiences under 18 from admittance. They claimed the ratings board was operating illegally by denying parents the right to choose who can watch the film, violating fundamental legal rights in Mexico.^[17]

• Empire's 100 Best Films Of World Cinema – #20^[43]
• Los Angeles Film Critics Association's Films of the Decade – #9^[44]
• The New York Times's Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made^[14]
• Entertainment Weekly's 25 Sexiest Movies Ever!^[15]
• The New York Times's 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century – #18^[45]
• The New York Times's 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century (Readers' Choice) – #55^[46]

• Y tu mamá también atIMDb  
• Y tu mamá también: Dirty Happy Things an essay by Charles Taylor atCriterion Collection