20/06/2011

Two of the biggest hits at the Taormina Film Festival, which ended yesterday on the Italian island of Sicily, came from neighbouring Spain – the mainstream comedy Cousinhood [+see also:
trailer
film profile] and the mosaic-like arthouse drama A Thousand Fools [+see also:
trailer
film profile].

The 3,000-seat Teatro Antico Greek theatre hosted an open-air screening of the Spanish comedy Cousinhood, the third feature by Daniel Sánchez Arévalo

The film is a broad comedy about three macho male cousins who return to the pueblo where they used to go for the holidays as children after one of them, Diego (Quim Gutiérrez) is stood up on the day of his wedding.

Slickly produced and accessibly played, the film reunites director Arévalo with a group of actors he worked with on his debut DarkBlueAlmostBlack [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (2006) and his second feature, Gordos [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Daniel Sánchez Arévalo
Interview with Daniel Sánchez-Arévalo,…
film profile] (2009). Besides Gutiérrez, they include Antonio de la Torre (most famous for his role as Penélope Cruz’s husband in Volver [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Agustín Almodóvar
interview: Carmen Maura
interview: Pedro Almodóvar
interview: Pénélope Cruz
film profile]) and, appropriately, the director’s own cousin, actor Raúl Arévalo. Newcomers to his troupe include TV actors Adrián Lastra and Inma Cuesta.

The film was produced by Mod Producciones, AXN and Atípica Films, with backing from ICAA and local broadcasters TVE and Canal+.

The festival’s main Mediterranean competition hosted A Thousand Fools, the latest film from veteran Catalan filmmaker Ventura Pons. The film presents 15 stories, grouped into three parts, and like Arévalo, Pons relies heavily on what worked in his earlier films, such as Barcelona, un mapa. Though more connected on a thematic than a narrative level, some of the 30-odd protagonists do pop up as secondary characters in some of the other stories.

The screenplay is adapted from a series of stories by Catalan writer Quim Monzó, who earlier inspired the director’s 1995 outing What’s It All About?. As the title suggests more clearly in the original Spanish, the film’s view of humanity is more tragicomic than cheerful.

The film was produced by Pons’ regular production company, Els Films de la Rambla, with Catalan broadcaster TV3 and national TV channel TVE providing financial backing.