15/04/2025 - Manuel Huerga reminds us why Jordi Pujol, former president of the Government of Catalonia, does not have a street, square or park in Barcelona named after him

It came as a complete surprise to learn that Manuel Huerga, a filmmaker who made his debut with the feature film Antártida (selected at Venice 1995, in the Overtaking Lane section) and in 2006 made the film Salvador (Puig Antich) [+see also:
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trailer
film profile] (selected for Un Certain Regard at Cannes), in which he already tackled thorny political issues, is returning to fiction film with Our Father, Our President [+see also:
trailer
film profile]. The film focuses on the corruption scandal that shook the family of Jordi Pujol, who served as president of the Government of Catalonia for more than two decades. Filmax will release it in Spanish cinemas on Wednesday 16 April, right in the middle of Easter.

A wonderful date to remember the life, work and sins of a family devout to the core, something that Huerga reflects throughout a film that continually jumps back and forth in time to portray Jordi's childhood, his combative youth, his courtship with Marta Ferrusola (his future wife), his shady banking dealings and his scheming to prevent his secret finances from ruining his career and his subsequent glory — ultimately depriving the city of Barcelona of an avenue bearing his name.

In 2014, a national newspaper revealed that the Pujol-Ferrusola family had been hiding large sums of money in Andorra. Although the politician tried to halt this tsunami, his efforts proved fruitless, even after he appealed to the Spanish royal family itself. The trial is scheduled for November 2025. And while we wait for that date, Our Father, Our President will revive a case that is, unfortunately, all too familiar among the political and powerful elite.

Starring Josep María Pou, who plays Jordi Pujol, and Carme Sansa, as his wife, Marta Ferrusola, Our Father, Our President - with a script by Toni Soler - alludes in its title to the burden of a father figure (and, it must be said, a mother too, as Marta never remained on the sidelines) in the evolution of a large family that prioritised wealth and social climbing over the ethics that the political leader preached in his speeches. Nerve, corruption and hypocrisy sat at the same table as joy, rivalry in the home and the pride of belonging to the upper class during those family dinners.

It was precisely this flaunting of wealth that led to the exposure of the financial crimes of this dynasty of wealthy businessmen, confident in their Catalan throne of independence-fuelled zeal. Self-serving politics – with appearances from several recognisable public figures, including monarch Juan Carlos I (another textbook example of corruption, played here by Alberto San Juan, who previously tackled the subject as a director in his film El Rey [+see also:
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Our Father, Our President is a production by Minoria Absoluta, Lastor Media, Vilaüt Films and Last Minute AIE. Its international sales are managed by Filmax.

(Translated from Spanish)