In the City of Sylvia (2007)

Essential Viewing

Spain/France

Feature Film

Original Title: En la ciudad de Sylvia

Writer/Director: José Luis Guerín

Cinematographer: Natasha Braier

Cast: Xavier Lafitte, Pilar López de Ayala

Plotless and near enough dialogue free, Guerín’s remarkably sensual film – in which a handsome young man returns to Strasbourg in search of a woman, Sylvia, who he had a brief encounter with six years earlier – is a piece that relies more on random faces and the ambient noise of everyday life than on conventional filmic techniques to portray the inner-life of its enigmatic protagonist, and whilst that might scare off most potential viewers, those willing to submit to its gentle rhythms are likely to experience a work of considerable beauty. Iain.Stott

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La Ciénaga (2001)

Highly Recommended

Argentina/France/Spain

Feature Film

Original Title: La ciénaga

Writer/Director: Lucrecia Martel

Cinematographer: Hugo Colace

Cast: Mercedes Morán, Graciela Borges, Martín Adjemián, Leonora Balcarce, Silvia Baylé, Sofia Bertolotto, Juan Cruz Bordeu, Noelia Bravo Herrera, Maria Micol Ellero, Andrea López

Martel’s allegorical gem of a feature debut – an unflinchingly brutal yet alluringly sensual portrait of an atrophying bourgeois family, descending into alcoholism, racism, incest, apathy, and arrogance – proves itself to be a work of considerable intelligence, skill, and integrity, and one that marks the birth of a substantial talent. Iain.Stott

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L'Appartement (1996)

Highly Recommended

France/Italy/Spain

Feature Film

Original Title: L'appartement

Writer/Director: Gilles Mimouni

Cinematographer: Thierry Arbogast

Composer: Peter Chase

Cast: Vincent Cassel, Romane Bohringer, Jean-Philippe Écoffey, Monica Bellucci

Mimouni’s very flashy but thoroughly entertaining feature debut - an intricately plotted romantic thriller, mixing great chunks of Hitchcock, a dollop of Shakespeare, and a dash of Kieslowski - is a consummately constructed film, boasting excellent performances, sumptuous photography and production design, and an ending to provoke, baffle, enrage, or inspire just about everyone. Iain.Stott

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Che Part Two (2008)

Cautiously Recommended

France/Spain/USA

Feature Film

Director: Steven Soderbergh

Writers: Peter Buchman, Benjamin A. van der Veen, Ernesto Che Guevara

Cinematographer: Steven Soderbergh (as Peter Andrews)

Composer: Alberto Iglesias

Cast: Benicio Del Toro, Pablo Durán, Eduard Fernández, Marc-André Grondin, Óscar Jaenada, Kahlil Mendez, Cristian Mercado, Franka Potente

Part two of Soderbergh’s Che Guevara biopic, this time focusing on the failed Bolivian campaign, is a more focused, linear work than the first, and just as compelling, persuasive, and well-made, but unfortunately its no more enlightening or insightful, with very little effort being spent on uncovering the inner emotions and character details of its enigmatic protagonist. Iain.Stott

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Che Part One (2008)

Cautiously Recommended

France/Spain/USA

Feature Film

Director: Steven Soderbergh

Writers: Peter Buchman, Ernesto Che Guevara

Cinematographer: Steven Soderbergh (as Peter Andrews)

Composer: Alberto Iglesias

Cast: Benicio Del Toro, Demián Bichir, Santiago Cabrera, Vladimir Cruz, Alfredo De Quesada, Jsu García, Kahlil Méndez, Elvira Mínguez, Andrés Manuel Munar, Julia Ormond, Catalina Sandino Moreno

Soderbergh’s admirably restrained and authentic feeling yet frustratingly unenlightening biopic of the larger-than-life Argentinian revolutionary, Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara, focuses on the guerrilla campaign that led to the Cuban revolution of 1959, depicting the man as the principled yet ruthless soldier that we all know and love/hate, without seemingly even attempting to reveal the man beneath the beret. Iain.Stott

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Free Zone (2005)

Recommended

Israel/Belgium/France/Spain
Feature Film
Director: Amos Gitai
Writers: Amos Gitai, Marie-Jose Sanselme
Cinematographer: Laurent Brunet
Cast: Natalie Portman, Hanna Laszlo, Hiam Abbass, Makram Khoury

Although the dialogue at times is a little didactic, this much maligned film (panned almost universally by critics and public alike), a talky, languorously paced, minimalist look at the middle eastern troubles through the eyes of an American outsider, is a frustratingly brilliant example of brave, uncompromising film-making, filled with excellent performances and dazzling formal experiments. Iain.Stott

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Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008)

Recommended

Spain/USA
Feature Film
Writer/Director: Woody Allen
Cinematographer: Javier Aguirresarobe
Cast: Rebecca Hall, Scarlett Johansson, Javier Bardem, Penélope Cruz, Christopher Evan Welch, Chris Messina, Patricia Clarkson, Kevin Dunn

Quite possibly Allen’s bleakest depiction of the impossibility of lasting human relationships (which is saying something), this sun drenched and sexy film, chronicling the carnal encounters of a pair of privileged American friends summering in Barcelona, boasts some excellent performances, not the least of which coming from the bewitching Hall (such incredible eyes), but lacks that (vital) hint of hope that made his, admittedly, largely pessimistic best works such bitter-sweet delights. Iain.Stott

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The Way I Killed My Father (2001)

Cautiously Recommended

France/Spain
Feature Film
Original Title: Comment j'ai tué mon père
Director: Anne Fontaine
Writers: Jacques Fieschi, Anne Fontaine
Cinematographer: Jean-Marc Fabre
Composer: Jocelyn Pook
Cast: Michel Bouquet, Charles Berling, Natacha Régnier, Amira Casar, Stéphane Guillon, Hubert Koundé, Karole Rocher

A successful doctor, with a beautiful wife, a sexy mistress, and a penchant for surgically enhanced prostitutes, finds his comfortable existence under threat when the arrival of his long absent father forces him to reappraise his life in Fontaine’s interesting if rather cold and slightly familiar study of masculine inadequacies and anxieties. Iain.Stott

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The Machinist (2004)

Best Avoided

Spain
Feature Film
Original Title: El maquinista
Director: Brad Anderson
Writer: Scott Kosar
Cinematographer: Xavi Giménez
Composer: Roque Baños
Cast: Christian Bale, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón, John Sharian, Michael Ironside, Larry Gilliard

The sight of Bale’s skeletal form is one the most distasteful things to ever appear on our cinema screens, but other than that, Anderson’s rather familiar Kafkaesque tale, following Bale’s machine operator through a waking dream of paranoia, déjà vu, and guilt, is really quite anodyne and forgettable. Iain.Stott

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FCB: The Inside Story (2004)

Cautiously Recommended

UK/Denmark/Germany/Spain
Television Documentary
Promotional Title: Barca - The Inside Story
Directors: Daniel Hernandez, Justin Webster
Cinematographer: Jorge Mota
Narrator: Justin Webster

A fly-on-the-wall, warts 'n' all (minus the warts, and not a great deal of the all) documentary following, for a season, the newly elected board-of-directors at Barcelona Football Club, which, despite skirting around potentially difficult issues and only ever showing these slick young men as thoroughly nice guys, is often surprisingly (if perhaps superficially) fascinating. Iain.Stott

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