A small point, but some people watched Bad Education and some La Mala educación. I think one only has the right to quote the Spanish title if one sees the original version, but in the 1990s there was a rare instance of a film released in both dubbed and subtitled versions in Britain. The subtitled version retained the title Gazon maudit while the dubbed version became French Twist.

(Another trivial point of translation is when the aspirant actor demands to be known as Angel because 'Ignacio Rodriguez' is such a pedestrian name. Common in Spain, certainly, but exotic to the West End audience!)

The flashbacks to the boarding school did seem cliched, because it's such a familiar story - I felt they could have been dispensed with entirely without loss. The rest of the film was fascinating and surprising, with tender scenes like the visit to the parents in the countryside, and it all looked great as is apparently Almodóvar's style.