Best Ibero-American Film?

by Nathaniel R

Kill the Jockey and I'm Still Here are hoping for both Oscar & Goya nominations

The Spanish Film Academy Goya Awards (essentially Spain's Oscars) aren't held until February 8, 2025 but they've released a list of the eligible titles for their "Best Ibero-American Film" category. This category has been around since the beginning of the Goyas with Argentina, Mexico, and Chile frequently favored among nominees and winners of the category.  Here are the 2024 entries they'll choose between for the Ibero-American nominations for the 39th annual Goya Awards...

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NYFF '24: "Afternoons of Solitude" is a Barbaric Beauty

by Cláudio Alves

When I was very young, I remember being besotted by bullfighting. Around where I grew up, the so-called art of the "tourada" was fundamental to the local culture, a noble practice to be celebrated. My parents were a tad horrified by my interest, and I was an ignorant child. For some reason, I had never realized what was happening in the arena, too blinded by the matador's glamorous figure, the dance-like spectacle, and the thunderous applause. But seeing it live and then watching TV recordings, I realized something. What I thought were theatrical tricks and mud were actual violence and blood splatter. Back then, I dreamed of being a vet, so the thought of all that animal pain made me feel nothing but revulsion for what I once found beautiful.

I was reminded of this while watching Albert Serra's Afternoons of Solitude, a documentary on Peruvian-born "torero" Andrés Roca Rey which earned the Catalan director the biggest prize at this year's San Sebastián Film Festival. For once, I saw some of the beauty again, along with the brutality and the horror. I felt tears in my eyes and nausea erupt from within. Quite the cinematic experience…

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TIFF '24: The Art of Dying in One's Own Terms

by Cláudio Alves

THE ROOM NEXT DOOR won the Golden Lion on the same day it first screened at TIFF.
Whether programmed with that intention or bonded by coincidence, one can often find films in conversation at festivals. Echoed themes and varied approaches to the same idea occur, often across sections, tying works together that were never meant to be considered in those terms. Some might disagree, but I find it to be a valuable experience, oft conducive to deeper thought, comparison and contrast. At this year's TIFF, for example, mortality was on many an artist's mind, from Godard, knowingly at the end of his rope, to the apocalyptic visions of Oppenheimer, Ostrikov, and Thibault Emin. From Cannes, there came meditations from Cronenberg and Schrader, films laden with grief, loss, and the need to take control. In documentary land, there are the recollections of an erstwhile death row inmate in The Freedom of Fierro.

Still, the most apparent conversation partners were two Spanish filmmakers, Pedro Almodóvar and Carlos Marques-Marcet, telling two euthanasia stories in The Room Next Door and They Will Be Dust…

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Three more Best International Film Contenders & Finalist Lists

by Nathaniel R

THREE KILOMETRES TO THE END OF THE WORLD © Vlad Dumitrescu

It's that time of year when countries are regularly announcing their Oscar submission. We started the week with 15 contenders but now we're at 18 and we have three new finalist lists, as well... 

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Víctor Erice's return will make you believe in miracles

by Cláudio Alves

Miracles haven't existed in movies since Dreyer.

So says a gruff film editor to his aged director friend in Víctor Erice's first feature in three decades, a work brilliant enough to make a lie of that line. Well, it was miraculous to me, though there must be some dissenters out there. Folks like Thierry Frémaux who infamously conned Erice into opening the flick at Cannes under the assumption it would play in competition. Only, Close Your Eyes didn't get to vie for the Palme d'Or, getting shafted into the newborn Premiere section. At this point, that farrago must be water under the bridge, though one presumes a big Cannes victory would have helped Close Your Eyes get to theaters sooner. For American audiences, it only now made it to screens, enjoying a limited release courtesy of Film Movement…

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