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Backed by Mediaset España and Movistar Plus+, Cadiz’s South International Series Festival made an inaugural splash last year, showcasing some of Spain’s biggest series of the season.

In 2024, the Andalusia-based event has moved to a post-Mipcom stop-over berth, and with France as the guest country, attendance could well scale up.

Spain has hosted major TV markets for years now, including Conecta Fiction each summer and Iberseries & Platino Industria, which unspooled in Madrid last week. South sets itself apart by being a true festival in the vein of Canneseries or the Monte-Carlo Television Festival in France. While there will be plenty of roundtables, networking, and B2B get-togethers at South, the event’s main objective is to showcase some of the best new and new-ish series from around the world.

“From the very beginning, the idea was to create something different from what was already being done in Spain,...

After a limited theatrical release, Lee Daniels' new supernatural horror film The Deliverance has finally landed on Netflix. Inspired by the terrifying Ammons haunting case, the R-rated movie stars Golden Globe Award-winning actress Andra Day as a struggling single mother who finds herself and her kids fighting for their lives against an ancient demonic force residing in their Pittsburgh home.

Joining Day in the horror flick are Glenn Close, Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Mo'Nique, Caleb McLaughlin, Anthony B. Jenkins, Demi Singleton, Omar Epps, Miss Lawrence, Tasha Smith, and others. I'm sure after watching this new movie, you'll be in the mood to want to watch something similar. Of course, you can always count on us at Netflix Life to help you out.

Below, we shared a list of seven scary exorcism movies that are streaming right now on Netflix.

The Conjuring (2013)Director: James WanWriter(s): Chad Hayes and Carey W. HayesCast: Vera Farmiga,...

The first 20 minutes of Close Your Eyes are better than almost every other movie this year, and they’re merely the memories of its main character—a ghost story written in celluloid. This prelude details a call to adventure, a request to seek out a dying rich man’s daughter...

Some five decades separate director Victor Erice’s debut film, The Spirit of the Beehive (1973), and his latest, Close Your Eyes. In between these twin professional highlights, there are two other features — El Sur (1983), a work haunted by the fact that filming was halted before a key scene was shot, and the brilliant documentary Dream of Light (1992) — as well as a half dozen or so shorts and anthology contributions, video installations and several potential projects snuffed out before they could start. That first movie, however, had already secured the Spanish...

"I lost my best friend, but I also lost my movie." Film Movement has revealed the official US trailer for an exceptionally great Spanish indie film titled Close Your Eyes, the first feature film in more than 30 years from an acclaimed Spanish filmmaker named Víctor Erice (The Spirit of the Beehive). It first premiered last year at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival, though only out of competition despite being such a strong film that many said should've been in competition. After playing at festivals all over the world all last year, FM will debut Close Your Eyes in limited US theaters end of August to start. A reflective culmination of Erice's career in film, Close Your Eyes is a haunting meditation on memory, absence, and the enduring resonance of the moving image. A Spanish actor disappears during the filming of a movie. Although he is never found, the police believe he went off a cliff.

Famed Spanish filmmaker Victor Erice has finally returned with his first solo directorial feature film in 30 years. In those intervening decades, he only made one other film, co-directed with the late Abbas Kiarostami. Now, Erice is back and making a meta statement with mystery feature “Close Your Eyes.”

The “El Sur” and “The Spirit of the Beehive” helmer directs this reflective career culmination that is set in contemporary Madrid. Watch the trailer below.

“Close Your Eyes” follows aging filmmaker Miguel Garay (Manolo Solo) who is called upon to recount his memories of working on his final and still unfinished film titled “The Farewell Gaze.” During its production, the lead actor and Miguel’s close friend Julio Arenas (José Coronado) disappeared without a trace, leaving in his wake a mystery that would haunt the lives of everyone associated with the film. Miguel never directed another project, instead living a quiet life...

It is seen as one of the greatest films ever, with the most hypnotic child performance in history. So what has Víctor Erice been doing in the half century since Beehive? As his new film Close Your Eyes hits screens, the Spanish legend reveals all

In 1972, when Ana Torrent was six years old, a man came to her school and asked her to be in his film. “He had a beard,” she recalls now, from her home in Madrid. “And I told him I didn’t like men with beards.” The director said his film was about Frankenstein’s monster and asked if she was familiar with that character. “I replied, ‘I’ve heard about him but I haven’t yet been introduced.’ That’s when he thought, ‘She’s the one.’”

The director was Víctor Erice and the film was The Spirit of the Beehive. Made at the end...

Víctor Erice’s “Close Your Eyes,” Andrew Haigh’s “All of Us Strangers” and Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” dominated this year’s 21st Ics Awards, winning the top prizes.

“Close Your Eyes,” which picked up best picture and best director, revolves around the mysterious disappearance of a Spanish actor during the filming of a movie. Although his body is never found, the police concludes that he has suffered an accident on the edge of a cliff. Many years later, the cold case resurfaces.

Justine Triet’s “Anatomy of a Fall” won three awards, including best actress for Sandra Hüller, original screenplay for Triet and Arthur Harari, and editing for Laurent Sénéchal. The movie is nominated for five Oscars, seven BAFTA’s and 11 Cesar Awards.

The romantic fantasy “All of Us Strangers,” meanwhile, won four prizes, including best actor for Andrew Scott, supporting actor for Jamie Bell, adapted screenplay for Haigh,...

Ja Bayona’s Society Of The Snow was the big winner at Spain’s Goya awards on Saturday night (February 10), scooping 12 prizes including best film and director to become the third-most garlanded film in Goya history.

Justine Triet’s Anatomy Of A Fall, was named best European film, and Pablo Berger’s Robot Dreams won the prizes for best adapted screenplay and feature animation.

20,000 Species Of Bees, the feature debut of Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren, received three Goyas for best new director and original screenplay for Solaguren, and best supporting actress for Ane Gabarain. The 15 nominations for Bees were the...

“20.000 especies de abejas”, “La sociedad de la nieve”, “Saben Aquell” y “Cerrar los Ojos” encabezan las nominaciones a los premios Goya 2024.

El pasado jueves se anunciaron los nominados de la próxima edición de los prestigiosos Premios Goya, el destacado evento anual que celebra lo mejor del cine español. La gala de los Goya 2024 se celebrará el 10 de febrero en Valladolid, con la actriz y cantante Ana Belén y por Los Javis como presentadores. Aquí os dejamos con la lista de los nominados de esta edición:

Mejor PELÍCULA

20.000 especies de abejas

Cerrar los ojos

La sociedad de la nieve

Saben aquell

Un amor

Mejor DIRECCIÓN

Víctor Erice, Cerrar los ojos

Elena Martín, Creatura

J.A. Bayona, La sociedad de la nieve

David Trueba, Saben aquell

Isabel Coixet, Un amor

Mejor PELÍCULA Europea

Aftersun (Reino Unido)

Anatomía de una caída (Francia)

Las ocho montañas (Italia)

Safe Place (Croacia)

Sala de profesores...

The Society Of The Snow has garnered 13 nominations, followed by Close Your Eyes and Jokes & Cigarettes with 11.

Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren’s 20,000 Species Of Bees leads the nominations for Spain’s prestigious Goya awards, which will be presented on February 10, 2024.

20,000 Species Of Bees premiered in competition at Berlin, going on to win the Silver Bear for best performance for Sofía Otero, playing an eight-year-old girl who spends a summer working in the Basque Country’s beehives while exploring her identity.

The film scored 15 nominations, including best film, best director and four nods in the acting categories.

Ja Bayona’s...

20,000 Species Of Bees, the debut film by Basque filmmaker Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren, and Society Of The Snow, J. A. Bayona’s survival drama for Netflix, have dominated the nominations at this year’s Goya Film Awards.

The nominations for Spain’s premiere film awards event were released this morning. 20,000 species of bees clocked 15 noms, including best film, screenplay, and best new director. Bayona’s Society Of The Snow clocked 13 noms, also landing in best film. Veteran Spanish filmmaker Víctor Erice trails behind with 11 nominations for his comeback feature Close Your Eyes, starring Ana Torrent.

20,000 Species Of Bees debuted at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, where lead actor Sofía Otero took the silver bear for best leading performance. The film is set during a summer in a village house linked to beekeeping and follows an eight-year-old and her mother experiencing revelations that will change their lives forever.

Bayona...

Stars: Sandra Escacena, Bruna González, Claudia Placer, Iván Chavero, Ana Torrent, Consuelo Trujillo, Ángela Fabián, Carla Campra, Chema Adeva | Written by Paco Plaza, Fernando Navarro, Coral Cruz | Directed by Paco Plaza

Opening the film on 15th June 1991, [Rec] co-director Paco Plaza sets the scene with a distressing phone call where a panicked girl tells the police that someone is inside her home. As officers pass a crying family outside, they enter the house to find it in disarray. The story then cuts to 3-days-earlier, as 15-year-old Verónica (Sandra Escacena) helps to look after her younger siblings while their mother works long shifts.

Using a Ouija board to try speaking with the dead during an eclipse, Verónica becomes possessed during the séance. As strange occurrences unfold around the schoolgirl, she is harassed by dangerous supernatural presences which threatens her family.

Plaza and co-writer Fernando Navarro loosely based this story on a...

First released 50 years ago, after Francoist censors convinced themselves that its anti-authoritarian messaging would have little social impact if buried under such a “boring” art film, Victor Erice’s “The Spirit of the Beehive” follows a gullible six-year-old girl named Ana (Ana Torrent), who sees a screening of “Frankenstein” when a mobile cinema arrives in the small Castilian village where she lives with her family in the Spanish Civil War’s immediate aftermath. Confused and horrified by the sight of Frankenstein’s monster accidentally killing a child, and the townspeople then killing Frankenstein’s monster in return, Ana’s elder sister tells her that neither of those things actually happened — that everything you see in films is fake. Later, with the memories of James Whale’s movie still fresh in her mind, Ana discovers a wounded republican soldier hiding in a sheepfold and decides to treat him with kindness instead of fear.

“Long-awaited” isn’t quite the term for Victor Erice’s “Close Your Eyes,” a film that dedicated admirers of the Spanish master may have hoped for, but didn’t dare expect. Instead, Erice’s first feature in 31 years — and only his fourth overall — arrives as something between a desert oasis and a mirage: a shimmery, nourishing culmination of ideas and ellipses in a career so elusive as to have taken on a mythic quality, to the point that his latest feels almost dreamed into being. But “Close Your Eyes” proves a disarmingly simple, emotionally direct film once its out-of-time aura settles. A story itself of disappearance and reemergence, and the potential of cinema to bridge past and present as if decades were days, it’s potent and poignant enough to reach newcomers to Erice’s work, even as fans pore over its self-reflexive details.

Having premiered at Cannes, “Close Your Eyes...

San Sebastian — Legendary Spanish writer-director Victor Erice received a standing ovation from a packed press conference on Friday, ahead of receiving the festival’s Donostia Award tonight.

The award ceremony for San Sebastian’s accolade for career achievement follows on from the San Sebastian screening this morning of his first feature film in 30 years, “Close Your Eyes,” which, already pre-sold to France’s Haut et Court, world premiered in Cannes Premiere in May with the Basque director notably absent.

“Close Your Eyes” sparked highly positive reviews. 30 years ago, Erice won the Cannes Jury Prize for his film “Dream of Light.”

Erice fielded questions from the press on Friday before the “Close Your Eyes” team joined him on stage.

“What I achieve in my work is trying to give the best of myself,” Erice told reporters. “Fate is key in an industrial art like cinema. Fate intervenes in filmmaking, but I...

Themes of aging have always undergirded Victor Erice’s work. His feature debut, 1973’s Spirit of the Beehive, is one of the finest of all coming-of-age films, capturing a few days in the life of young girl as she struggles to understand, through nascent eyes, the evils and contradictions of life in Francoist Spain. Ten years later came El Sur, Erice’s famously incomplete adaptation of Adelaida García Morales’s novella, another story about a child who grows gradually aware of her country’s—and family’s—troubled past. And 1992’s The Quince Tree Sun saw Erice turn his attention more explicitly to art as a means of physical and spiritual preservation: the act of ossifying a moment in time in an attempt to stave off the inevitable.

Now, after three decades and a smattering of shorts (including a multipart collaboration with Abbas Kiarostami), Close Your Eyes marks the 83-year-old...

San Sebastian Fetes Veteran Director Victor Erice

Veteran director Víctor Erice will be honored with the San Sebastian Film Festival’s Donostia Award at its upcoming 71st edition, running from September 22 to 30. Actress Ana Torrent will present the Basque filmmaker with the prize at a ceremony on September 29, preceding a screening of his new film Close Your Eyes. The tribute coincides with the 50th anniversary of Erice winning San Sebastian’s top Golden Shell award for first solo feature The Spirit of the Beehive. Torrent made her big screen debut at the age of seven years old in the film and recently reunited with him in Close Your Eyes. San Sebastian has accompanied Erice across his career. Prior The Spirit of the Beehive, his 1969 directorial debut Los Desafíos, co-directed with José Luis Egea and Claudio Guerín, was selected for Official Selection and received the Silver Shell for Best Director. His...

Victor Erice, one of the greatest of Spanish filmmakers, will receive a prestigious Donostia Award, given for career achievement, at the San Sebastian Film Festival.

The award will coincide with a screening of Erice’s latest film, “Close Your Eyes (Cerrar los Ojos),” which world premiered at Cannes in May.

Few awards seem more appropriate. The statuette will be presented to Erice by Ana Torrent, on the 50th anniversary of “The Spirit of the Beehive,” Erice’s multi-leveled masterpiece, which starred a 6-year-old Torrent and went on to win San Sebastian’s Gold Shell, its highest award.

It was Erice’s first feature, “Los Desafios” — a triptych anthology produced by Elías Querejeta and presented by a youthful Erice at San Sebastián in 1969 — that helped give San Sebastian a social-issue edge which it has never abandoned, compounded by “The Spirit of the Beehive” and José Luis Borau’s 1975 film “Poachers.”

Screening in the Cannes Premiere section,...

Victor Erice, one of the most acclaimed and influential Spanish directors of all time, has made his long-awaited comeback with his new film Close Your Eyes ( Cerrar los ojos ), which premiered in the Cannes Premiere section at the 76th Cannes Film Festival on 22 May 2023.

Close Your Eyes is Erice’s first feature film in 30 years, since his 1992 docudrama The Quince Tree Sun, which won the Jury Prize at Cannes that year. Erice is also known for his classic debut The Spirit of the Beehive (1973), which is widely regarded as one of the best Spanish films ever made, and his second feature El Sur (1983), which was released as an unfinished version due to funding problems.

Close Your Eyes Clip

Close Your Eyes is a drama film that stars Manolo Solo, José Coronado, and Ana Torrent. It tells the story of Miguel Garay, an aging filmmaker and novelist who hasn’t made a movie in decades,...

One of the most prized moments of Howard Hawks’ macho manifesto Rio Bravo is when Dean Martin’s Dude kicks back, gazes lightheadedly at the ceiling, and moseys into a rendition of the western ballad “My Rifle, My Pony and Me,” accompanied on guitar and harmonica with a sense of second nature by Ricky Nelson and Walter Brennan. It’s an oasis of calm, of earned sentimentality, in the steeliest and most no-nonsense movie of its Hollywood era, and an emblem of the male camaraderie––sans queer shading, for sure––beloved of its most famous fans, most notably Quentin Tarantino.

Víctor Erice, however––in his first feature since a mysterious absence following 1992’s The Quince Tree Sun––has now made the ultimate homage. The centerpiece of his comeback film Close Your Eyes is its lead, melancholic filmmaker and writer Miguel Garay (Manolo Solo), busting out his acoustic during a communal...

Spanish director expresses disappointement it was not programmed in Competition after turning down an offer from Directors’ Fortnight.

Spanish director Victor Erice, whose film Close Your Eyes is screening in Cannes Premiere, has published an open letter in Spain’s El País newspaper explaining that he is not in Cannes personally as he is disappointed by the decision of delegate general Thierry Fremaux to not programme the film in the main Competition.

Erice said he wanted to put the record straight after reading a report in El Pais that the film was not selected for Competition because it was not ready in time.

Updated with festival response: Spanish director Victor Erice, who was absent from the Cannes Film Festival premiere of his film Close Your Eyes, has posted an open letter criticizing festival Delegate General Thierry Frémaux over his handling of the selection of his film and explaining his decision not to attend.

Revolving around an investigation into the disappearance of an actor during a film shoot, Close Your Eyes is Erice’s first feature in three decades.

The film premiered to strong reviews on May 22 in the Cannes Premiere sidebar, created in 2021 to welcome films from more established filmmakers, with key cast Helena Miquel, Jose Coronado, Ana Torrent, Manolo Solo and María León in attendance but without Erice.

In an open letter posted on the website of Spain’s El Pais newspaper on Thursday, Erice said he had submitted the film to Official Selection as well as the Cannes parallel section of Directors’ Fortnight.

Paris-based sales boutique Alpha Violet has acquired Spanish filmmaker Victor Iriarte’s directorial debut, “Foremost by Night” (“Sobre Todo de Noche”).

Described as a noir story with a political background, “Foremost by Night” revolves around two women who meet for the first time, one who was forced to give up her newborn child for adoption when she was young, the other who, unable to bare children of her own, adopted a child she raised as her own.

The film, which stars Ana Torrent, Lola Dueñas and Manuel Egozkue, was among this year’s winners at the Malaga Film Festival’s Work in Progress awards, where it secured the Latido Films distribution prize and the Aracne Digital Cinema award for post production services.

The Spanish-Portuguese-French co-production was produced by Spain’s La Termita, Inicia Films, Atekaleun and Csc Films; Portugal’s Ukbar Filmes; and 4A4 Productions in France. The film also shot in all three countries,...

Veteran Spanish actor Ana Torrent was around five-years-old when she was cast in her first movie, the landmark drama The Spirit of the Beehive, by maverick filmmaker Víctor Erice.

Fifty years later, the pair have reunited on a new pic, Close Your Eyes (Cerrar los ojos), Erice’s first feature-length film in over a decade. The film debuts Out-of-Competition in the Cannes Premiere section on Monday.

The film follows a famous Spanish actor, Julio Arenas, who disappears while shooting a film. Although his body is never found, the police conclude that he’s been the victim of an accident by the sea. Many years later, the mystery surrounding his disappearance is brought back into the spotlight by a TV show outlining his life and death, showing exclusive images of the last scenes he filmed, shot by his dear friend, the director Miguel Garay.

On paper, the 76th Cannes Film Festival looks like an embarrassment of riches, assembling no shortage of big guns in terms of major-name filmmakers.

Pretty much every list of hotly anticipated titles will be topped by Martin Scorsese’s Killers of the Flower Moon, an epic Western crime drama based on David Grann’s nonfiction book about the murder of Indigenous Americans on tribal land in 1920s Oklahoma. Likewise, it seems redundant to include Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, given the legions of fans already jostling to watch Harrison Ford crack the whip one last time in James Mangold’s conclusion of the beloved action-adventure franchise.

New works from celebrated filmmakers are simply too numerous to cram into a rundown of just ten titles, so their absence here should not be misinterpreted as lack of interest.

That includes Ken Loach’s story of tensions caused by the arrival...

Paris-based Haut et Court has closed French distribution rights with sales agent Film Factory Entertainment on Victor Erice’s ”Close Your Eyes” (“Cerrar los ojos”), the legendary Spanish director’s return to feature film direction 30 years after Cannes Jury Prize winner “Dream of Light” and a half century on from his milestone debut, “The Spirit of the Beehive.”

“Beehive” is regarded by many critics as one of the greatest Spanish films ever made. “Light” was chosen by the world’s cinematheques as the best film of the 1990s. “Close Your Eyes” reunites Erice with Ana Torrent, a wide-eyed mite in “Beehive.”

One of the most awaited Spanish films of 2023, it will be released in Spain by Avalon Films, the producer-distributor of “Alcarràs.”

“Close Your Eyes” turns on a famed actor who disappears while making a film. Many years later, a TV program airs the final scenes he shot, the beginning...

Three first features from Spain’s burgeoning next generation of female filmmakers, led by Cannes Critics’ Week winner Laura Ferrès, is one highlight at this year’s Málaga Work in Progress, an Málaga Festival industry centerpiece where productions such as “The Platform” first saw the light of day.

Playing in Malaga Wip, “The Platform” was acquired by Latido Film which sold the title to Netflix at Toronto. It has gone on to rank as the third most-watched non-English movie ever on Netflix.

At least three titles – Spanish road movie “Devil Dog Road,” horror pic “The Hidden City,” the neo-noir “Foremost by Night” – boast genre gristle. Some titles turn on gender oppression (“As Neves”), female self-discovery (“Mara’s Vacation”) or sexual diversity (“I Trust You”). Many, especially from Spain, have social-issue overtones.

Production companies range from established indie forces – Madrid’s Aquí y Allí, Buenos Aires’ Magma Cine, Portugal’s Ukbar Filmes – to on-the-rise outfits,...

Stories about the gay heyday of 1970s San Francisco — and the cruel chaser of the AIDS crisis the following decade — often hang on the notion of chosen family within the queer community: the bonds formed when blood ties are severed by prejudice. Studies of biological family, and parenthood especially, in that context are more unusual, which is what makes Alysia Abbott’s book “Fairyland: A Memoir of My Father” so moving. An account of her upbringing by a gay single father amid the LGBTQ liberation movement, and her subsequent nursing of him through AIDS, it balances an eager child’s-eye acceptance of counterculture living with an older woman’s melancholy over things unsaid or misspoken. In “Fairyland,” Andrew Durham adapts her story with warmth and sensitivity, though those perspectives are more fluently bridged on the page than on the screen.

A photographer making his feature-length debut as writer-director, Durham initially...

Cerrar los ojos

After a three-decade-long absence from filmmaking, Victor Erice returns to cinema with what is only his fourth feature. Cerrar los ojos reunites him with the star of his last film (El sol del membrillo): Ana Torrent. Production took place in Granada, Almería, Asturias and Madrid up until December. José Coronado, María León, Petra Martínez, Soledad Villamil, Mario Pardo, Elena Miquel and José María Pou also star in the film. The story of a disappearance, the film revolves “around issues such as identity and memory.”

Gist: This tells the story of how a famous Spanish actor, (José Coronado) disappears during the shoot for a movie.…...

Film Factory Entertainment has picked up international sales rights to Victor Erice’s highly anticipated “Cerrar los ojos,” which marks the fourth feature by the legendary Spanish filmmaker, writer-director of “The Spirit of the Beehive,” reuniting him with Ana Torrent, the wide-eyed very young star of that milestone film.

Now wrapping its shoot in Granada, Almería and Asturias before moving to Madrid, “Cerrar los Ojos” is set for 2023 Spanish theatrical release by “Alcarràs” distributor Avalon.

Erice’s fourth feature, following on 30 years after Cannes Festival Jury Prize winner “El sol del membrillo” (“Dream of Light”), “Cerrar los ojos” is written by Erice and Michel Gaztambide, a Spanish Academy best screenplay Goya Award winner for “No Rest for the Wicked.” The story of a disappearance, the film revolves “around issues such as identity and memory,” its producers announced Monday.

Producer Cristina Zumárraga lead produces the production through Tandem Films, the company...

“Bosé,” the highly anticipated Paramount Plus Original, has wrapped production. The announcement comes as Paramount Plus has also confirmed the remainder of the internationally recognised cast of the six-part series, a biopic of Spanish singer-songwriter Miguel Bosé.

Two behind-the-scenes images, shared in exclusivity with Variety, also hint at the production ambitions of the series, one of the biggest Spanish-language series to date at Paramount Plus, which turns on one of the most resonant figures in recent times in Spain. Resonant for his hits, which span a remarkably long six-decade career, and for his life story, which charts Spain’s emergence from more oppressive times to hard-won freedoms in democracy.

Produced by Vis, a division of Paramount, in collaboration with Shine Iberia, part of Banijay Iberia, Pepe Baston’s Elefantec Global and Legacy Rock, “Bosé” will premiere exclusively on the Paramount Plus International streaming service in the coming months, Paramount Plus also confirmed Tuesday.

Project development platform to take place virtually, ahead of physical FIDMarseille

French festival FIDMarseille has revealed the projects set to be presented at project development event FIDLab, including upcoming features from the UK’s Ben Rivers and last year’s grand prix winner Carolina Moscoso.

The 13th edition of the incubator event, known for its focus on experimental films spanning both documentary and fiction, will take place online – as it did for the first time last year – from June 14-18. The main FIDMarseille festival is planned to go ahead in-person from July 19-25.

FIDLab will include 16 projects, selected from 502 submissions,...

The 65th Valladolid International Film Festival kicks off this Saturday and will offer a programme brimming with auteurs and highly personal propositions, with Isabel Coixet set to open the gathering. While it could easily rain on one of the days when the Seminci is unspooling – between 24 and 31 October – in Valladolid, a flurry of snowflakes is not overly likely, as opposed to what Isabel Coixet suggests could happen in the titular Mediterranean tourist hotspot in It Snows in Benidorm. Indeed, this, her new film, will have the honour of opening the storied Valladolid International Film Festival this Saturday. The lucky recipient of the recent 2020 National Film Award will present her movie – which was produced by the Almodóvar brothers’ El Deseo outfit, and which stars Timothy Spall, Sarita Choudhury, Carmen Machi and Ana Torrent – in the Calderón Theatre at an edition of the festival that,...

In this week’s International TV Newswire Variety recaps more Natpe news from All3Media, Comedy Central Latin America, AMC’s Acorn TV, Vis, El Deseo, Globo and Univision, Zed pre-sales from Realscreen and Aardman’s latest distribution pickup.

All3Media Sells to Comedy Central, AMC Networks in Latin America

Comedy Central Latin America and All3Media International have closed a deal for Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s Golden Globe-winning comedy “Fleabag” to premiere on the network later this year. The series is produced by Two Brothers Pictures for BBC Three and Amazon Prime in association with DryWrite Productions and All3Media International. Comedy Central Latin America is the latest international broadcaster to pick up the show from All3Media, following deals with Wowow in Japan, ABC in Australia and Sky New Zealand.

AMC Network’s streaming service Acorn TV picked up more than 180 hours of All3Media International’s primetime drama. Included in...

Exclusive: Viacom International Studios has set a co-development deal with El Deseo, the Spanish production company owned by brothers Pedro and Agustín Almodóvar, for an eight-episode series, Mentiras Pasajeras (White Lies).

The companies will co-develop the series under the direction of Spanish screenwriters Nerea Castro and Blanca Andres. Vis confirmed the news on the final day of Natpe in Miami, where Vis and other ViacomCBS divisions have had a strong presence.

El Deseo, which produces both film and TV projects, was formed in 1985 by Pedro Almodovar. The noted filmmaker’s latest release, Pain and Glory, earned a Best Foreign Language Film nomination and also a Best Actor nod for Antonio Banderas.

“We are honored to have entered into this agreement with internationally distinguished production company, El Deseo, which will further expand our portfolio with more world-class productions and properties,” said Federico Cuervo, Svp and Head of Viacom International Studios. ”We...

The major problem with “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” — the fifth installment in this dinosaur series, and the second of a prospective trilogy — is that the makers treat the action and suspense sequences in the way most of us go to the dentist.

Director J. A. Bayona (“A Monster Calls”) goes through the motions of these scenes, even staging a “hiding from dinosaurs” set piece that was the most memorable section of Steven Spielberg’s original “Jurassic Park” movie from 1993. But what was exciting and scary then feels expected and very hackneyed now.

This new “Jurassic” begins with a tedious sequence set during a nighttime rainstorm where one of the dinosaurs wakes from its slumber to scare some men. This is shot and edited in such a sluggish way that it comes close to feeling inept, but mainly it suffers from lack of enthusiasm. (How hard is it to make running...

What’s this? A horror movie on Netflix worth watching? “Verónica” appears to be just that, as “[Rec]” director Paco Plaza’s film has received across-the-board critical praise in addition to six Goya Award nominations (including Best Film) in its native Spain. Currently sitting at 100% “fresh” on Rotten Tomatoes, the film is now streaming.

The Film Stage‘s Jared Mobarak suggests it’s worth your time:

“Having this type of break-neck speed conclusion seems to be a pattern with Plaza (although ‘[Rec]’ is my only point of comparison), but who cares if it works? At the end of the day a horror film is successful if it can make your heart pound out of your chest. And for most of ‘Verónica,’ Plaza and Navarro do exactly that.”

Ditto Anton Bitel of SciFiNow:

“The film ultimately favours the paranormal – yet Plaza still slyly insinuates an alternative explanation, rooted in the protagonist’s psychosexual unravelling.

Paco Plaza's Veronica was released on Netflix this week. The film is a horror film, involving: a Ouija board, an eclipse and a demonic summoning. This film has played several film festivals in 2017, including the Toronto International Film Festival. This is a dramatic horror film. And, Veronica stars newcomers: Sandra Escacena, Bruna González, Claudia Placer and Ana Torrent. Fernando Navarro, of Muse (2016) fame, developed the script. A trailer and story details are available for Veronica here. Veronica is set in 1991. After a family tragedy, Verónica turns to friends Rosa (Ángela Fabián) and Diana (Carla Campra). Verónica wants to contact her dead relative. But, something is waiting for her, in a supernatural dimension. Now, a strange presence haunts Verónica, in her family home. The film's debut on Netflix was a bit of a surprise. As well, Veronica has won several awards. There was no official announcement of the film's debut,...

Every week, IndieWire asks a select handful of film critics two questions and publishes the results on Monday. (The answer to the second, “What is the best film in theaters right now?”, can be found at the end of this post.)

This week’s question: In honor of “The Florida Project,” which has just started its platform release across the country, what is the greatest child performance in a film?

Jordan Hoffman (@JHoffman), The Guardian, Vanity Fair

I can agonize over this question or I can go at this Malcolm Gladwell “Blink”-style. My answer is Tatum O’Neal in “Paper Moon.” She’s just so funny and tough, which of course makes the performance all the more heartbreaking. She won the freaking Oscar at age 10 for this and I’d really love to give a more deep cut response, but why screw around? Paper Moon is a perfect film and she is the lynchpin.

Teenage girls have always been ripe fodder for horror filmmakers. Either as monsters or victims (or both), the body changes (not to mention the change in treatment by other people, especially men) and vulnerability of girs at this age can make for some interesting metaphors of terror. In Paco Plaza's latest feature film Verónica, he shines the light on one such girl whose dabbling in mischief goes horribly wrong. Verónica (or Vero, ably potrayed by newcomer Sandra Escacena), has a bit more on her plate than the average teenage girl: with her mother (Ana Torrent) constantly working, Vero is left in charge of her younger sisters and brother, feeding them, getting them dressed and to school in the morning, and babysitting most nights. On top...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

The story goes that the police were dispatched to a Madrid residence in June of 1991 only to find a teenage girl screaming from what appeared to be self-inflicted wounds. Strange phenomena was seen/found throughout the apartment, so much that the detective assigned the case could do nothing but corroborate the paranormal explanation being delivered by those close to the family. Everything supposedly stemmed from a seancé gone wrong three days earlier at the exact time of a solar eclipse. The teen hoped to contact her father only to discover it was something else that responded. A wild story to be sure, the simple fact it proved the first recorded account of the supernatural by a police officer in Spain made it worth a closer look.

The men who dug deeper: director Paco Plaza (one half of the duo behind contemporary horror classic [Rec]) and co-writer Fernando Navarro. They took that...

Each month, the fine folks at FilmStruck and the Criterion Collection spend countless hours crafting their channels to highlight the many different types of films that they have in their streaming library. This April will feature an exciting assortment of films, as noted below.

To sign up for a free two-week trial here.

Monday, April 3 The Chaos of Cool: A Tribute to Seijun Suzuki

In February, cinema lost an icon of excess, Seijun Suzuki, the Japanese master who took the art of the B movie to sublime new heights with his deliriously inventive approach to narrative and visual style. This series showcases seven of the New Wave renegade’s works from his career breakthrough in the sixties: Take Aim at the Police Van (1960), an off-kilter whodunit; Youth of the Beast (1963), an explosive yakuza thriller; Gate of Flesh (1964), a pulpy social critique; Story of a Prostitute (1965), a tragic romance; Tokyo Drifter...

Exclusive: Upcoming horror follows a woman who attempts to bring back her dead father through a Ouija ritual.

Film Factory has licensed French rights to [Rec] director Paco Plaza’s upcoming horror film Veronica.

Arp Selection will distribute the story which producer Apache Films claims to be based on the only unexplained supernatural case in the annals of the Spanish police.

Sony has earmarked an autumn release in Spain on Veronica, about a young woman who must protect her younger brother and sister after she attempts to bring back the spirit of their dead father through a Ouija ritual.

Ana Torrent will star with Leticia Dolera, Consuelo Trujillo and newcomer Sandra Escacena in the lead role.

Enrique López-Lavigne from Apache Films serves as producer. Film Factory chief Vicente Canales brokered the deal with Michèle Halberstadt and Laurent Petin for Arp Selection.

“We’re glad to have closed this deal with such a good company as Arp Selection and to...

David Siegel, Onata Aprile and Scott McGehee on the set of What Maisie Knew.

The directors of the marvelous and absorbing What Maisie Knew, Scott McGehee and David Siegel, knew what they wanted with Henry James, Onata Aprile as Maisie, and the relationship to her rock-star mother played with rock-star style by Julianne Moore. Alexander Skarsgård, as Lincoln, the mother's new husband turns a visit to Turtle Pond in Central Park into a pivotal turtle purchase in Chinatown.

My conversation in midtown Manhattan, led us to Tilda Swinton, Little Red Riding Hood, Virginia Woolf, and Ana Torrent from The Spirit Of The Beehive, swarming around disclosures of what it means to continuously grow up.

Anne-Katrin Titze: Waiting for this interview, I was debating with myself if I should start with a question from the outside in or from the inside out - with the costume design for Julianne Moore and...

★★★★★ As General Franco lay dying during the summer of 1975, Carlos Saura was mirroring Spain's monumental era of transition through the story of a young girl struggling with issues of mortality. Saura's Cria Cuervos (Raise Ravens, 1976) is a poignant portrait of the final whimpers of the Franco regime in, masquerading as a deeply personal rites of passage tale. It's still very much Franco's Spain when we intrude upon the Madrid household of the recently widowed Anselmo (Héctor Alterio). He dies suddenly amidst the throes of passion with Amelia (Mirta Miller), the wife of fellow army officer Nicolás (Germán Cobos).

However, it appears this was no natural death - he was poisoned. The apparent culprit of this calculated murder? None other than one of his three daughters, Ana (the magnificent Ana Torrent), a wise beyond her years girl who blames her father for the death of her mother (Geraldine Chaplin). Cría Cuervos...

Busy week of movie and TV watching for me beyond seeing Mama (read my review here) and The Last Stand (read my review here) in theaters. I watched Criterion's new Blu-ray for Andrei Tarkovsky's Ivan's Childhood, which I really liked and am already halfway done with my review and will have finished by Tuesday or Wednesday depending on how long it takes me to finish writing up the 2012 RopeofSilicon Awards. If you're not familiar with what the RopeofSilicon Awards are, this will be the fifth year I've declared my own selection of awards and you can see the previous four years right here. This year I am also going to bring back the vote for the best film of 2012 as I did in 2010 and 2009 and neglected to do last year. Here were the results from 2010 and 2009: 2009 2010 Inglourious Basterds Avatar Up Star Trek The Hurt Locker Up In the Air...

Clandestine Childhood

Directed by Benjamín Ávila

Argentina, 2011

Philadelphia Film Festival

Benjamín Ávila’s debut feature is a fine balance of youthful longing and militant resistance.

Ernesto (Teo Gutiérrez Romero) has two names. One name – Ernesto – is for his schoolmates, but he goes by Juan at home. His parents also have two names. Horacio goes by Daniel (César Troncoso) and Cristina by Charo (Natalia Oreiro). It’s Argentina in 1979, and five years after Perón’s death, Horacio, Cristina and charismatic Uncle Beto (Ernesto Alterio) continue the fight against the existing regime through violent tactics.

Using a mixed-media strategy where moments of extreme violence are depicted through graphic animations, Ávila’s film keeps the focus firmly on Juan and his budding relationship with a classmate’s sister, María (Violeta Palukas).

Romero’s surprisingly tender and mature performance recalls the two great Ana Torrent roles from the 1970s in Spirit of the Beehive and Cria Cuervos.

Clandestine Childhood

Directed by Benjamín Ávila

Argentina, 2011

Philadelphia Film Festival

Benjamín Ávila’s debut feature is a fine balance of youthful longing and militant resistance.

Ernesto (Teo Gutiérrez Romero) has two names. One name – Ernesto – is for his schoolmates, but he goes by Juan at home. His parents also have two names. Horacio goes by Daniel (César Troncoso) and Cristina by Charo (Natalia Oreiro). It’s Argentina in 1979, and five years after Perón’s death, Horacio, Cristina and charismatic Uncle Beto (Ernesto Alterio) continue the fight against the existing regime through violent tactics.

Using a mixed-media strategy where moments of extreme violence are depicted through graphic animations, Ávila’s film keeps the focus firmly on Juan and his budding relationship with a classmate’s sister, María (Violeta Palukas).

Romero’s surprisingly tender and mature performance recalls the two great Ana Torrent roles from the 1970s in Spirit of the Beehive and Cria Cuervos.

His 1975 classic Raise Ravens still points the way for new film-makers wishing to tackle the tricky subject of the Spanish civil war. The old revolutionary reminisces to Giles Tremlett

Carlos Saura once wanted to murder his parents. Not literally, he stresses, but he remembers wishing them dead. "If they were punishing me I would sometimes think, 'Let them die!'," the veteran Spanish film director says. Ana, the child protagonist of his 1976 classic Raise Ravens, is also fond of a bit of parricide. She thinks, indeed, that she has killed her father and – in an attempt to repeat the trick – tries to poison her aunt and persuade her mute grandmother that she too might like some of the deadly powder.

Fortunately for Ana (and her family), the substance she thinks is elephant-strength poison is really bicarbonate of soda. Her powers over life and death exist only in her head – though...