Carlos Villafaina (who helmed the movie La filla d’algú in 2019 together with a group of his peers from ESCAC and, five years later, several instalments in the series Nudes) has been shooting his solo feature debut, Festina Lente, starring Nacho Sánchez (nominated for a Goya Award for Manticore and Seventeen) and Telmo Irureta (who scooped a Goya thanks to The Rite of Spring) alongside his aunt Elena Irureta (Goya-nominated for Deaf) and Sandra Pujol. The movie was born of the writer-director’s own experiences, and its title is a Latin expression that roughly translates as “hurry up slowly”. 

The film introduces us to David, a 32-year-old music teacher (played by Nacho Sánchez) who has to take care of his twin brother, Amador (played by Telmo Irureta), a cerebral palsy sufferer, when their mother passes away. With the brothers having been distant for years, David will be torn between his independence and his brother’s dependency, as it is still unclear who will end up being Amador’s guardian. Thus, these two strangers will be forced to cohabit, as they will have to set aside their differences and make amends with the past that separated them in order to start seeing each other for what they are: two siblings capable of caring for one another.

The director of the film, which has been shot in Catalonia over the last few months, states: “I have a twin brother with cerebral palsy. Javier has been my responsibility for a long time. When we started secondary school, he went to a vocational training centre for the first time. This was the moment when our differences, defined by functional diversity, became more marked. Up until that point, he and I had maintained a relationship as brothers on an equal footing, and disability had not been an issue. That’s when our relationship changed, and we stopped behaving like brothers/friends and began to look at each other within a dynamic where I gradually became another father figure. I experienced this time feeling so much responsibility that I started fearing the death of my parents. What would happen when I became responsible for my brother’s life? Would I be able to do a good job? Is it something I really wanted to do? And would my brother be able to take care of me as well?

“This movie is aimed at those people who believe they don’t know how to take care of others and, at the same time, are the very ones who have proven to care the most. Simultaneously, its objective is to champion a kind of cinema that reflects functional diversity in an authentic and honest way. My father often used to say that there was no point hurrying with my brother, that it was necessary to rush slowly. That was our 'speed game'. I was frantic in my constant movement; he was leisurely in his inseparable calmness. In the middle was this void where we would never meet,” he sums up.

Festina Lente is a production by Spanish outfit Astra Pictures (founded by Sergio Grobas) and Belgium’s Saga Film (headed up by Flavia Biurrun and Hubert Toint), which has secured funding from the ICAA and support from ICEC, and boasts the involvement of RTVE and 3CAT, as well as backing from the Wallonia-Brussels Federation Film and Audiovisual Centre. BNP Paribas Fortis Film Finance is also on board, and the movie has secured the support of the Belgian Federal Government’s Tax Shelter.