Spanish Cinema Now. 10.

As the director/co-writer (with Tomàs Aragay) of one of my favorite dark ensemble pieces, In the City, Cesc Gay is a filmmaker whose work I'd prefer not to miss. So the belated American debut of his and Aragay's 2006 film Fiction (Ficció), via the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Spanish Cinema Now series, was a must-see that did not disappoint. His life-like pacing (some might call it slow; though for me it's real) results in a gift for capturing the moment - lots of them.

Like In the City, Fiction is another ensemble piece, but more tightly focused on a much smaller ensemble. It tells the story of a filmmaker (the magnetic Eduard Fernández, also seen in this series' Before the Fall) who's gone off to the country to visit old friends and perhaps make some headway on a new script. His host is played by Javier Cámara, whose retrospective (including this film) is one of the highlights of this year's series. The bond between these men and their several friends and relations forms the heart of the movie, particularly one new relationship that develops along the way.

Things happen - some major, some minor - but none of these events are handled in a manner at all similar to how most filmmakers might approach them. We never really know where things are headed, and this is another factor that makes Gay's work so lifelike and surprising. His entire ensemble (including the children, one of them very young) does fine, moment-to-moment work, and his capturing of the beauty of the Spanish mountains and countryside - in sun, shade or storm - is simply beautiful, as are the gorgeous locations. As to the women in the cast, while all give good performances, the meatiest role goes to Montse Germán (also seen in this series' My Prison Yard), and she is very fine indeed.

The ending of the film put me in mind - oddly, I admit - of the wonderful French romantic comedy Shall We Kiss (which is to be released here in 2009 by Music Box Films). The two movies could not be more different in tone or style, yet both come up against one of life's more persistent problems/temptations: how to handle sexual attraction when one or both parties are committed elsewhere. The way in which these two films approach, play with, and resolve this question are so rooted in the culture of each country that they're practically primers on French and Spanish behavior. Which is preferable? I can't imagine living without either. Fiction screens again, Tuesday, December 23 - tonight! - at 8:15 pm.

Last Saturday, SCN offered a rather special program of Avant-Garde Shorts - perhaps a tad more avant-garde than some of us might have wished, since none of these shorts were subtitled. Although this rendered the mid-section of the program relatively worthless for us non-Spanish-speaking listeners, the first and last of the shorts contained almost zero dialogue but some terrific visuals. So, two out of six made the 69 minutes at least bearable.

The program kicked off the a delightful and very early piece of stop-motion visuals called The Electric Hotel (El hotel elctrico) by Segundo de Chomón from 1908, in which husband/wife travelers check into the hotel of the future where one's luggage unpacks itself and much else magically happens to make life easier. Until, as so often occurs with Con Edison and elsewhere, problems with the electricity set in. This "short" short proved a perfect way to begin the afternoon, but then the lack of subtitles took over.

The following four films - Ernesto Giménez Caballero's The Essence of the Fair (Escencia de verbena) from 1930; An Announcement and Five Cards (Un Annuncio y cinco cartas) from 1937 and The Fakir Rodriguez (El fakir Rodriguez) from 1938, both by Enrique Jardiel Poncela; and Sabino Antonio Micón's The Story of a Bottle (Historia de una botella) from 1948 - were all so top-heavy with dialogue that little understanding of what was going on seemed possible.

This left the final film, 1958's Fire in Castillo (Fuego en Castillo) from Jose Val del Omar to carry the torch for the avant-garde. With only perhaps two lines of dialogue but some breathtaking photography, lighting and design centering on the religious sculpture of the city of Valladolid, the movie did more than deliver. Accompanied by a surprisingly contemporary musical score, this almost shocking film managed to introduce something that looked very much like torture porn into the cinematic vocabulary long before the Hostel or Saw franchises, let alone the Bush administration, made it au courant. One could not help but wonder if Mel Gibson managed to view this one before creating his tortured Passion. Simply for the first and final offerings in this program, I'm glad to have braved the winter storm to attend.

Posted by dwhudson at December 23, 2008 7:08 AM