Michel Franco's cinema is the visual equivalent of the phrase “I'm not racist/sexist/classist, but…” Addicted to strong themes, the Mexican director tries (or believes) to find the right distance so that the controversies he stages are imbued with shades of gray. However, when it comes down to it, he almost always lets slip a gesture that reveals his satisfaction at being a provocateur, or a plot twist that condemns the most disadvantaged. It must be said, however, that considering the unhealthy precedents, Dreams relatively easily places itself at the upper end of his filmography. This is because for a good part of the running time, Franco allows the faces and bodies of his actors to express themselves: the relationship between the wealthy American philanthropist played by Jessica Chastain and the virtuoso Mexican dancer she patronizes is driven by a genuine desire that crystallizes in carnal choreographies. In these moments, the film manages to prevent the clear allegory about the balance of power and dependence between the nations represented by the protagonists from crushing the human scale of the effects. But in the universe of the author of Nuevo orden, good things never last long, and the narrative advances with deterministic resignation to bring out the worst in human nature and punish characters whom, for a naive moment, we had believed the director considered something more than an instrument for his thesis.

If he has to choose, Fernando Franco will always choose the most arduous path. His filmography speaks of a filmmaker who doesn't like to make things easy for himself, and who imposes a double challenge on himself: to frontally address uncomfortable issues – the unstable nature of a woman with borderline personality disorder in La herida, the agony of a terminally ill patient in Morir, the sexuality of a person with cerebral palsy in La consagración de la primavera– without falling into the morbid sensationalism that these offer. This purpose makes more sense than ever in La luz, which features the most unassailable protagonist of all those the director has portrayed: a priest who becomes aware of the gravity of the abuses he inflicted on minors three decades ago.

In his book Tale of cinema, critic Dennis Lim points out the importance of hotels in the cinema of Hong Sangsoo, as if his characters were unconsciously gravitating towards spaces they cannot make their own. In recent times, however, the filmmaker has become increasingly interested in habitable locations, such as the finca d'Up There or, most notably, the large family home that, at the beginning of What Does This Nature Tell You?, awakens the admiration of the young poet Donghwa. His girlfriend Junhee explains that it was her father who built it and, curious, Donghwa approaches the door to contemplate it better, precipitating the accidental encounter with her in-laws, who invite him to spend a day with them that will turn out to be equally revealing and humiliating.

For Shintaro Kago, the body is a playground. Or open-source software susceptible to modification (or, directly, hacking). Or a piñata that needs to be burst to discover what candies and toys it hides in its belly. All of this, in short, to say that the panels of the mangaka, a distinguished guest of this year's Comic Barcelona, spill fluids, viscera, and all sorts of unimaginable substances. , the title just published by Moztros, is no exception: the four chapters that make up the bulk of this volume have as their leitmotif the intrusion of sharp items (worms, cables, spaghetti...) that cause havoc and burst the characters from the inside out.With this premise, it is understood that Kago is one of the most prominent contemporary exponents of eroguro, a Japanese aesthetic tradition that delights in showing grotesque scenes, extreme violence, and aberrant sexuality, and which, far from being the exclusive heritage of manga, links revered ukiyo-e painters such as Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, writers like Edogawa Rampo, and filmmakers acclaimed at Sitges like Shinya Tsukamoto. In addition to defending a particularly psychedelic take on nausea (it's no wonder that the twisted electronics producer Flying Lotus commissioned him to design the cover for his album

It is not common for a director specializing in animation to pivot to live-action convincingly. And it is even rarer for the leap to be even more successful than their previous work. A notable surprise, then, is The Sheep Detectives, where Kyle Balda, one of the barons of the Gru and Minions franchise, brings to the screen the homonymous novel by Leonie Swann (published in Spanish by Salamandra), starring a woolly flock that sets out to solve a murder. It could be argued that the fact that the animals talk and move thanks to digital effects places the film on a borderline with Balda's previous experiences, but far from resorting to caricature, the filmmaker optimizes hyperrealistic technology to make it the humorous pillar of the proposal, reserving eccentricity for details that enrich the background, such as the abundance of neons that incongruously illuminate the small British town where the story takes place.

“A film by Laurent Cantet directed by Robin Campillo”. The opening credits announce the unique nature of Enzo. The soul of the project lies with Cantet, who, upon learning he had cancer, wanted to work with his co-screenwriter, editor, and friend Campillo to ensure the film would reach completion. The Palme d'Or winner for *La classe* died during pre-production, and the fact that Campillo wanted to keep his authorship in the background reveals that this is a film the director of *120 pulsacions per minut* would have preferred not to make.

Cédric Jimenez is fascinated by law enforcement. Or, more precisely, the faces behind them: their routines, their dedication, their noble fallibility. Until now, he had approached the issue from the codes of the expeditious policeman and with a certain claim to realism, to the point of presenting, in November, a spectacular recreation of the investigation after the Paris attacks of 2015. Zone 3 maintains the thematic motif, but changes the focus to look towards the day before yesterday's world: the French government, in addition to implementing a zone system that prevents residents of the banlieue from accessing the capital's city center, leaves surveillance and police investigations in the hands of an artificial intelligence from which it is almost impossible to escape.

Let's start by resolving the question that has surely arisen as you've looked at this review: who on earth is Lee Cronin? He is a director with two previous feature films, A hole in the ground and the appreciable Possessió infernal: el despertarPossessió infernal: el despertar. Credits that hardly justify including his name and surname in the title of a work, a deference usually reserved for demiurges like Fellini. It is possible, however, that this christening has less to do with the ego of the Irish filmmaker and more with the marketing juggling of Warner Bros. and Blumhouse to try to retain the hook of an iconic figure of the fantastic like the mummy and, at the same time, distance it from recent filmic incarnations, the fiasco starring Tom Cruise and the adventurous, family-friendly franchise led by Brendan Fraser.

Two Prosecutors begins with the gate of a prison opening and ends with another closing. This circular trajectory delimits the hero's adventure, Kornev, a young prosecutor in Stalin's Russia, who, upon discovering the torture and forced confessions to which the survivors of the old guard of the Communist Party in his region are subjected, wants to bring this scandal to the attention of the Soviet leadership. The problem, however, is that his idealistic view (that of someone who "is still a virgin," as some characters who see themselves in his path slyly insinuate) is the only one that doesn't realize the corrupt world he moves in.

French cinema maintains a particularly close relationship with its musical stars. From Juliette Gréco to Benjamin Biolay, many musicians have stepped in front of the camera in projects that don't appear to be mere promotional vehicles, but rather natural extensions of their artistic aspirations. One of the most recent additions to this tradition is Juliette Armanet, a singer who seems to have developed a taste for acting in recent years, and who finds in Choosing my life The intersection of their talents.

Maybe The bride! (The bride!) has as its starting point The Bride of FrankensteinBut it's neither a sequel, nor a remakenot one reboot nor any other label affiliated with Hollywood's franchise logic. Maggie Gyllenhaal, an actress who has never shied away from risk (she revealed herself with the sadomasochistic romance of Secretary) and that in The Dark DaughterHer directorial debut, while acknowledging influences like Claire Denis and Lucrecia Martel, presents the film as a fiercely autonomous manifesto of pop feminism. This is clear from the opening scene, in which Mary Shelley confesses that in Frankenstein She was only able to capture a fragment of what she wanted to tell. Then, the writer's specter cracks the diegesis and literally possesses the body of a prostitute who will become the protagonist of a feverish fiction.

Hamnet It is no longer the only film currently showing that revolves around Hamlet. In Scarlet, Mamoru Hosoda It draws inspiration from Shakespeare's immortal text, although it takes considerable liberties, such as changing the name and gender of the main character to transform her into a medieval princess who travels through time and space in a purgatory to bring to justice those who murdered her and her father. Unlike its literary model, Scarlet She doesn't need any specter to drive her to revenge; she alone possesses a rage of epic proportions, as befits the emotions that characterize adolescence, which is precisely the territory most frequently explored by the director of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time and The Boy and the Beast.

If one of the factors that allows us to gauge the value of an artistic text is its ability to establish a personal and unique dialogue with everyone around it, there is no doubt that Wuthering Heights It is a masterpiece. Further proof is that this novel by Emily Brontë has inspired such diverse film adaptations as those by Luis Buñuel during his Mexican period, Jacques Rivette, and Yoshishige Yoshida, who took the British joke to feudal Japan.

Two decades ago, Hellboy He burst onto the Hollywood scene with two blockbusters Eccentric and baroque, directed by Guillermo del Toro, and with Ron Perlman exuding charisma beneath the prosthetics and red skin of the infernal anti(super)hero born from Mike Mignola's comics. After the failure that was the character's revival under Neil Marshall's direction in 2019, Hellboy: The Crooked Man It returns to the screen with the coordinates of a modest production made on the fringes of the industry.

I'm not sure if, as Paul Schrader states, Marty Supreme and The mastermind by Kelly Reichardt They are the same film played at different speeds. But it does seem clear that their protagonists are cut from the same cloth: two sociopaths who wander the world convinced they are destined for a greatness incompatible with everyday life, and who embark on selfish crusades with catastrophic consequences. This psychological profile is not at all coincidental with the fact that the Marty Mauser embodied by Timothée Chalamet—with glasses, a little mustache, and electric gestures—is also a clear exponent of American exceptionalism; he demonstrates this every time he tries to convince his interlocutors that he deserves special treatment and that his presence as an American elevates the world ping-pong championships.

Just take a look at the clear-line characters that inhabit Bow His universe, besieged by climate catastrophe, hints that Ugo Bienvenu has honed his sensitivity and awareness to the point of reminiscent of Moebius's comics and Hayao Miyazaki's films. But, although the director doesn't hide his influences, it would be unfair to view the film as a mere homage or a replica of others' achievements. Among other things, because Bienvenu has been cultivating this style for years in comics that explore similar themes to those in his first feature film (Ponent Mon has published his works in Spain). In fact, the author had received several offers to adapt his comics for film, but he preferred to develop a new story for the screen, imagining the encounter between two children from different times: Iris, who lives in the world of the day after tomorrow, amidst long-distance parent-child relationships and domes that serve as shelters from torrential rains, destined for a time-traveling journey for which he may not yet be ready. The film's elegant design does not forgo spectacle or a sense of wonder, but where it truly shines is in the human scale of a narrative freed from Manichaeism and clear antagonists, and in its desire to seek heartbreaking lyricism in unexpected places such as, for example, the agonizing memory of a...

The fable which give its name to the latest film of Daniel Sánchez Arévalo These are not fanciful tales told by the fireside, but rather traditional music groups rooted in the Pontevedra region, participating in competitions that can lead to spectacular choreographies that go far beyond folklore. This is how the director ofDark blue almost black upon seeing the recording of a group attacking with bagpipes, tambourines and timpani the Thunderstruck from AC/DC. This was the spark that inspired RondallasA dramedy where music is the mortar that reunites a town touched by the tragedy of a fishing boat shipwreck.

It has been difficult, but it seems that a certain consensus has been reached in considering that the so-called delinquency cinema It is one of the most reliable references for examining where Spain stood during the transition. That stark decline of the noir genre, narrated almost entirely in the first person by juvenile delinquents who blurred the lines between themselves and the alter ego that they embodied on screen, is the point of reference of Blows, the first feature film directed by Rafael Cobos, a regular screenwriter for Alberto Rodríguez.

I don't know if Blue moon It's the best film of the year, but I would venture to say it's the most heartwarming. This is no small feat, given that it begins by announcing the death of its protagonist, Lorenz Hart, the lyricist who forged a memorable collaboration with composer Richard Rodgers, to whom we owe milestones of musical theater such as My funny Valentine or the song that gives the film its title. But Hart, who in the film has the features of a shrunken Ethan Hawke with a prosthetic bald head, possesses enough charisma to make us forget the mournful anticipation and gladly accompany him to the bar where he takes refuge from the premiere ofOklahoma!, a show that his colleague Rodgers performed with Oscar Hammerstein. To the spite of that infidelity is added the nervousness of the imminent encounter with the young woman who has fascinated the homosexual Hart, who projects onto her a naive romantic ideal.

Stephen King wrote The running man (published in Spanish as the wantedIn the early seventies (a decade before publishing it under the pseudonym Richard Bachman), he wrote the novel, setting it in the year 2025 in a dystopia where the underprivileged participate in risky television game shows hoping to escape poverty. The most extreme (and lucrative) of these is the one that gives the book its title, turning participants into fugitives who must survive the pursuit of relentless hunters and all the viewers hoping to earn a reward by reporting them. Now that the present has caught up with the chronology of the fiction, the prediction of a society absorbed by a harmful audiovisual culture seems accurate, but not particularly shocking.