Country: Spain – Wimbledon Film Club

El Sur

Victor Erice is little known outside Spain despite the plaudits earned by his 1973 debut, The Spirit of the Beehive. In part this is because he has only made 3 feature-length films. El Sur was his follow-up, and arguably his masterpiece, though the finished film is only half of what he planned, the producers having…
Official Competition

Argentine directing duo Gaston Duprat and Mariano Cohn brings together two of Spain’s most famous actors: Penelope Cruz (Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner for Woody Allen’s Vicki Cristina Barcelona), plays indie darling director Lola Cuevas; Pedro Almodovar’s ‘male muse’, Antonio Banderas (Cannes Best Actor winner for Pain and Glory) the film star Felix Rivero. While…
Parallel Mothers

In keeping with Pedro Almodovar’s more recent work, notably Julieta (2016) and Pain and Glory (2019), this is a film about the weight of the past and the need for forgiveness. The story interweaves two threads: a drama of maternal confusion that could have been little better than soap opera in other hands, and an…
Summer 1993

It’s summer and Frida (Artigas), a 6 year old orphan is bereft. Her uncle’s family take her from Barcelona to give her a fresh start in the countryside of Catalonia. Frida finds her new world hard to adjust to: unfamiliar people and places. Will she allow herself to take the risk of reconnecting as the…
Neruda

Inventive constructed biopic – part fiction, part fantasy – of the Nobel prize-winning Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, from director Pablo Larrain (Jackie, No, The Club). A fictional inspector played by Mexican actor Gael Garcia Bernal (star of previous WFC films Motorcycle Diaries and Even the Rain) is caught in a cat and mouse thriller in…
The Olive Tree

Alma is very close to her grandfather although he has retreated into dementia. The family has sold of his beloved thousand-year-old olive tree, to pay his debt, but the loss of the tree has brought the grandfather into a depression. When her grandfather refuses to eat, Alma sets out to find the tree for him.…
Marshland

In post-Franco Spain two detectives with conflicting political ideologies pair up to solve a murder case in a remote wetland area in the south of Spain. Their mutual mistrust is mirrored by the cold reception from reactionary locals. Brilliant edge-of-your seat detective thriller. Sight & Sound. 41 awards.
Wild Tales

Six short films within a film provide a blackly comic and highly enjoyable portrayal of middle class meltdown within what writer/director Szifron calls the ”crazy system” and ”corrupt space” of modern Argentina. The influence of co-producer Pedro Almodovar, who along with his brother funded the film, is evident; Szifron also cites the work of Steven…
Blancanieves

Based on the 1812 fairy tale Snow White by the Brothers Grimm, the story is set in a romantic vision of 1920s Andalusia. However, the film approaches storytelling through the integration of Spanish culture from characters’ names to traditions they follow. Additionally, it alludes to other fairy tales including Cinderella and Little Red Riding Hood.…
Even the Rain

A film within a film. Cast & crew descend upon a Bolivian town to make a low-budget movie about Columbus in America and the original exploitation of local people, and succeed in replicating that exploitation. Things fall apart as cheaply hired extras abandon filmmaking to protect their water rights from privatisation by a multinational company…