Until a few weeks ago, filming for Bunker was underway in London and Madrid. The psychological thriller stars Oscar winners Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem, and is directed by Florian Zeller, the French filmmaker who won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Father [+leggi anche:
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intervista: Florian Zeller
scheda film] in 2021 and went on to release The Son [+leggi anche:
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The director wrote the script himself and has said he created it especially for the Spanish couple, as he wanted to weave the real experience of long-term cohabitation with the conflicts raised by this fiction. According to its director, it is a thriller that delves into the emotional and moral challenges faced by a couple under pressure from the world around them, exploring the fears, doubts and dilemmas that define this turbulent era we live in.

The plot follows an architect (Javier Bardem) who accepts a morally ambiguous project – building a survival bunker for a tech billionaire. His decision prompts his wife (Penélope Cruz) to question their marriage after 17 years together.

This marks the eighth time Cruz and Bardem have appeared together in a film project – though not always sharing scenes – following Jamón, jamón, directed by Bigas Luna back in 1992; Live Flesh, by Pedro Almodóvar; No News from God, by Agustín Díaz Yanes; Vicky Cristina Barcelona, by Woody Allen (for which Penélope won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress in 2008); Loving Pablo [+leggi anche:
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scheda film], by Fernando León de Aranoa; The Counselor [+leggi anche:
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scheda film], directed by Asghar Farhadi. Cruz is currently promoting her new film in the United States, Maggie Gyllenhaal's The Bride!, and will also appear this year in Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo's La bola negra (read news). Bardem was recently seen in F1: The Movie and Dune: Part Two, and will soon star in Rodrigo Sorogoyen's new film, El ser querido (read news), which is already set to be a strong contender at Cannes.

Completing the main cast of Bunker are British actor Stephen Graham (creator and star of Adolescence [+leggi anche:
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scheda series], for which he won the Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Miniseries or TV Film) and American actors Paul Dano (recently seen in The Wizard of the Kremlin [+leggi anche:
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scheda film] and the series The Studio) and Patrick Schwarzenegger (known for the third season of The White Lotus). They are joined by Mark Gatiss, Eileen Atkins, Nimmi Harasgama, Greta Bellamacina, Karen Ascoe, Owen Brazendale, Michael Ballard and Lola Ogunyemi.

Bunker is produced by Florian Zeller and Federica Sainte-Rose for the French company Blue Morning Pictures, and Fernando Bovaira and Simón de Santiago for the Spanish company Mod Producciones, with support from Eurimages and ICAA. Its executive producers include Alice Dawson, Mariano Cohn, Gastón Duprat, Andrés Duprat, Emanuel Núñez and Fernando Sokolowicz. Sales are handled by US company FilmNation Entertainment.