Presented out of competition at the 29th Malaga Film Festival, Ladies’ Hunting Party is the latest film by Pedro Aguilera, the director behind such eclectic titles as Sister of Mine [+lire aussi :
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interview : Pedro Aguilera
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fiche film]. This time, he has taken on a bold challenge, in the eyes of some as daring as Fernando González Molina’s reinterpretation with My Dearest Señorita [+lire aussi :
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Shot in stark black and white, it was an allegory of a fratricidal Spain, the legacy of the Civil War and the subsequent Franco dictatorship, saturated with sweat, tension and testosterone. Ladies’ Hunting Party revisits the suffocating atmosphere and underlying violence that grows more intense as the film progresses, but replaces the macho group from the original with a gathering of female friends who are not quite so friendly, all under the blinding summer light of the Extremadura scrubland.

Blanca (played by Blanca Portillo), Rosa (played by Rossy de Palma) and Carmen (Carmen Machi, who returns to Extremadura after her role in the gritty summer film Piggy [+lire aussi :
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interview : Carlota Pereda
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interview : Pilar Palomero
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With this aim in mind, Aguilera gradually reveals the conflicts between the three women of high social standing — privileged members of society who continue to enjoy their elevated status and who (mis)treat their servants from a position of superiority. The shadow of another cult film, Mario Camus’s incredible Los santos inocentes, looms overs these dynamics. The film succeeds as a social critique of power and its abuses, corruption, resentment and frustration. It also works as a humorous yet scathing portrait of a section of society that rejects equality (but whose membership is growing everywhere), whilst infusing a plot with savage humour and irony, leading to an ending which, although predictable, carries echoes of Greek tragedy, the Western and even the safari film. Here, however, it is not elephants or lions that are killed, but rabbits, a ferret and the occasional vermin.

Ladies’ Hunting Party is a film produced by the Spanish company  Gonita in co-production with Día de caza AIE and Mondex et Cie (France). The film will be released in Spanish cinemas on 5 June, distributed by Sideral, with Latido Films handling sales.