For Sant Jordi, books, roses... and a lot of cinema. Which is proposed to us every year at this time by the Barcelona-Sant Jordi International Film Festival, better known as BCN Film Fest, whose themes are linked to literature and history. Lovers of the seventh art have the best excuse to enjoy from April 18 to 26 an attractive, extensive and varied program at a very popular price: 4.90 euros per ticket.
The inaugural film at Verdi cinemas has a Catalan title. House in flames is a dramatic comedy by Dani de la Orden with a luxury cast. Emma Vilarasau, Enric Auquer, María Rodríguez Soto, Alberto San Juan, Clara Segura, José Pérez-Ocaña and Macarena García are the protagonists of this choral story about a family that exposes its dirty laundry in a meeting during a weekend on the Costa Brava. A very interesting starting signal in an event that, in the words of its director, Conxita Casanovas, “each film will have its space, its meaning, in a practical festival in which we have achieved parity naturally.” This year's poster stars actress Setsuko Hara in Late Spring, by Yasujiro Ozu, a legendary Japanese filmmaker to whom tribute is paid with a selection of twelve essential films.
The BCN Film Fest continues to rely on a striking red carpet along which stars such as Richard Gere, Johnny Depp, Jeremy Irons, Susan Sarandon, Wim Wenders and Isabelle Huppert have walked, and which in this eighth edition will be attended by Meg Ryan and Richard Linklater as distinguished guests. The American actress, queen of the romantic comedy in the late eighties and nineties with classics such as When Harry Met Sally, Something to Remember or You've Got Email, will appear with What Happens Next, her second feature film as director, which marks her return to the genre accompanied by David Duchovny and will participate in the official section. The story tells how an ex-couple reunites at an airport for the first time since they separated decades before.
For his part, his compatriot Linklater, “the icing on the cake of the festival” for Casanovas, will receive the Honor award during the closing gala. The Texan director, one of the main exponents of independent cinema of the nineties and creator of titles such as Boyhood, Movida del 76 or the acclaimed trilogy Before Sunrise, Before Sunset and Before Nightfall, will present the action comedy Hit Man, released out of competition at the Venice festival, where it received unanimous applause from critics. Co-written and starring Glen Powell, the film is inspired by an incredible true story. The actor plays Gary Johnson, a prudish professor who discovers that he has a hidden talent as a fake hitman and who finds a client who steals his heart and ignites a powder keg of deception, pleasure and confused identities.
In total there will be 69 titles that will be screened these days, 15 of them are world premieres, 20 Spanish and 11 Catalan. Within the official section there will be a large representation of Spanish and Catalan cinema. Like Enlightenment, by Pau Teixidor; Free Fall, by Laura Jou, with Belén Rueda and J.A. Producer Bayonne; Disco, Ibiza, Locomía, in which Kike Maíllo tells the rise and fall of the first Spanish electro dance group, or La casa, by Alex Montoya, with David Verdaguer in a moving portrait of grief.
From the international scene, Daaaaaali! stands out, where the Frenchman Quentin Dupieux dissects the figure of the famous and surrealist Catalan artist in a delirious comedy. Freud's Last Session, with Anthony Hopkins, or Memory, by Michel Franco, with Jessica Chastain and Peter Sarsgaard. And more titles. We will always have tomorrow, directed by actress Paola Cortellesi. L'Amour et les forets, by the French Valérie Donzelli, with a Virginie Efira who falls into a toxic relationship. And the young Luana Bajrami, only 22 years old, is directing Phantom Youth, a portrait of two twenty-something cousins with no future prospects in the Kosovo of 2017. Vincent Perez, leading man of French cinema in the nineties, will come to the Catalan capital with The edge of the blade, a historical drama set in Paris in 1887 that features a feminist fencing master ahead of her time. At 90 years old, Michael Caine leads the cast of Oliver Parker's The Great Escape, where he plays a war veteran.
Green Border, Rest in Peace, Maya's Fate, Irene's Promise or Hammarskjöld. Fight for peace are other proposals in an official section that will also feature the documentary Joan Baez I am a noise, which explores the veteran singer-songwriter's relationship with both her abusive father and Bob Dylan. Baez will have a virtual conversation with the public, like Meg Ryan. At Cinema amb Gràcia there will be comedy with Books
