Competencia Oficial

Hoping to leave some kind of legacy, an ageing billionaire (José Luis Gómez) sets his sights on making a hit movie and assembles an all-star team for it. He hires the Cannes Palme d’Or-winning filmmaker Lola Cuevas (the amazing Penélope Cruz) to direct the ambitious project. In addition, two great actors with even bigger egos are arranged: Hollywood heartthrob Félix Rivero (Antonio Banderas) and groundbreaking theatre actor Iván Torres (Oscar Martínez). Both are legendary—but they hate each other. Lola puts them to the test in a series of increasingly eccentric challenges in preparation for the shoot. The question is whether anyone will be left standing when the cameras start rolling… ‘Rather than a love letter to the cinematic arts, this very funny Spanish-language satire… is more of a poison pen jab to the jugular. It dismantles the lofty ambitions of cinema as great, important and significant, a monument on the cultural landscape. Instead, it shows us art for ego’s sake, and it has a lot of wickedly spiteful fun doing so… It is Cruz, fiercely deadpan and utterly bonkers, who steals the film… This may be the most perceptive film about the movie-making business since Tom DiCillo’s “Living in Oblivion.”’—Wendy Ide, The Observer