2018 Films

Chef’s Diaries: Scotland

Joan, Josep and Jordi are the renowned Roca brothers, heirs of a family tradition that led them to create one of the world’s best restaurants: El Celler de Can Roca. The brothers set out to discover a country whose cuisine is little known in the world – a raw diamond that will surprise them and bring them new challenges. The best candidate to do that is… Scotland.

Handia (Giant)

Having fought in the First Carlist War, Martin returns to his family farm in Gipuzkoa only to find that his younger brother, Joaquín, towers over him in height. Convinced that everyone will want to pay to see the tallest man on Earth, the siblings set out on a long trip all over Europe, during which ambition, money, and fame will forever change the family’s fate. A story based on true events.

A Fantastic Woman

Marina is a waitress and an aspiring singer. Her older boyfriend Orlando owns a publishing house. They are happily forming a life together, when Orlando unexpectedly dies. Marina struggles to maintain her dignity and her right to grieve when his family seeks to bar her from the funeral and the police suspect her of complicity.

Lots of Kids, a Monkey and a Castle

Muchos hijos, un mono y un castillo is about Julita Salmerón’s childhood wishes, and how all three ended up being granted. When her youngest son realizes that his mother has lost the vertebra of his murdered great-grandmother, kept for three generations, the family launches into an outlandish search among the weird and wonderful objects Julita has hoarded in her more than 80 years, revealing a picturesque gallery of characters.

Hopelessly Devout

Carmen, a devout Catholic woman from Malaga, is about to be chosen leader of her local religious guild. But it all goes up in smoke when her biggest rival is chosen: Ignacio, a ridiculous, arrogant man who is also hell-bent on demoting her from her post. After an unfortunate “accident”, Ignacio is left unconscious in the bathroom and Carmen is forced to keep him hidden in her home all the while she receives a series of unexpected visitors.

Veronica

Madrid, the 90s. In the middle of the night, the police receive a call. Amid screams of terror, they hear children shouting out about the presence of strange phenomena in their flat, deep in a working-class district. Two days earlier, Veronica, their older sister, had used the Ouija board at school. Without realizing it, she has opened the door to something supernatural, inexplicable, which will move into her house over the next hours, becoming incontrollable and, above all, very dangerous.

The Summit

At a summit for Latin American presidents in Chile, where the region’s geopolitical strategies and alliances are in discussion, Argentine president Hernán Blanco endures a political and family drama that will force him to confront his own demons. He will have to come to two decisions that could change the course of public and private life forever: one regarding a complicated emotional situation with his daughter, the other the most important political choice of his career.

Marshland

High tension in Alberto Rodriguez’s noir film, as two outsider cops uncover some sordid truths in the Andalucian wetlands. Marshland is noirishly tense on different levels, its tight focus on character, its realism, it’s sense of place and its social critique adding up to a grippingly intense whole — and that’s not to mention it’s satisfyingly twisting plotline.

Militiawomen

Militiawomen relates the intense investigation to discover the identity of five militia-women executed in Mallorca in 1936. One picture and the existence of an anonymous journal, attributed to one of them, are the only clues. Is it possible, 80 years later, to discover the identities of those who remain silenced at the bottom of the graves?

One Day I Saw 10,000 Elephants

Angono Mba, an 80 year-old Guniean, recalls the expedition when he worked as porter for the filmmaker Hernandez Sanjuan, traveling around Spanish Guinea from 1944 to 1946, in search of a mysterious lake where, legend would have it, you could see 10,000 elephants. From the Spanish filmmaker’s obsession with finding something, to the actual adventures of the expedition, comes this tale of fascination with Africa, the past, and memory.

Help Me Make It Through the Night

A family is at its breaking point. Dad kicked mom out the house because she has a gambling addiction, the older child’s fiancée wants to cancel their wedding, and the youngest child believes he can fix his family and bring them back together. An accident will make everyone reconsider their decisions; the doctors say one of them will not make it through the night.

Mist and the Maiden

The corpse of a young man appears in a forest on the island of La Gomera. The case closes with the accusation to a local politician who is exonerated in the later judgment. Three years later, Sergeant Bevilaqua and his assistant, Corporal Chamorro, are sent to the island to revive the investigation. Corporal Anglada accompanies them, the last one who saw the young man alive.

Black is Beltza

A high-profile 2D animated feature. Che, Otis Redding, Jimi Hendrix and Charles de Gaulle all appear in this voyage from Harlem to Cuba to Algeria, that offers up an unusual mix of music and adventure in the midst of the Cold War.

October 1965. Pamplona’s troupe of giant figures, a typical sight at the San Fermín festivities, is invited to parade along Fifth Avenue in New York. But not all of them will be allowed to appear: due to racial discrimination, the American authorities will ban the participation of the two black giants. A truly entertaining delicacy.

The Bastards’ Fig Tree

Near the end of the Spanish Civil War, a “trigger happy” fascist soldier turns into a singular hermit. He gets caught up in the care of a fig tree after the look in a ten year old child’s eyes, son of one of his victims, awakes in him the certainty that the kid will kill him as soon as he reaches sixteen years of age.

The Brave Class

The brave class is a social experiment investigates the importance of language in the way we understand the world. The documentary includes analysis from more than 20 experts including linguistics, journalists and politics such us Owen Jones, Inigo Errejón, Inaki Gabilondo or Estrella Montolio.

The Shortest Afternoon

The Alicante Film Festival has preselected this year’s films. The theme of the showcase this year is focused on Spanish society, from political concerns to new lifestyles. The screening consists of seven short-films: four comedies, a drama, a thriller and a dystopia. These stories are told with a great deal of imagination, sense of humour and intrigue.