Caloundra Film Festival

Touted as a “comedic slam dunk” by The Hollywood Reporter, Spain’s exuberant 2019 foreign language Oscars entry is the ultimate feel-good film that will leave audiences grinning from ear to ear.

Javier Gutiérrez (Marshland, Truman) stars as Marco Montes, the assistant coach for a Spanish basketball team who is ambitious, arrogant and has reached the end of his emotional tether. After publicly disgracing himself in a fight with his head coach, he drives drunk straight into the back of a police car and is sentenced to community service. To his dismay, Marco must now whip an amateur basketball team to shape. But this could prove to be his greatest challenge yet, as the team is made up of players with varying mental disabilities.

Featuring an endearing slew of characters easy to fall in love with, bright cinematography and lively pacing, it is no surprise that Champions smashed the Spanish box office records with its heart-warming message about the importance of trust, sympathy and breaking down prejudices.

Cannes film festival regular Jamie Rosales (Beautiful Youth) returns with this bold and utterly absorbing portrait of a young painter who travels to the Catalan countryside after the death of her mother.

Petra (Bárbara Lennie) an artist in her 20s, arrives to take up a residency in the workshops of Jaume, a sculptor of grand-scale commissions. Jaume’s Catalan estate encompasses forest lands and a magnificent home. Invited to dinner by the great man’s wife Marisa, Petra speaks of art as a path to the truth. Marisa, it transpires, has reason to be sceptical about such idealism: the truth Petra seeks is the identity of her father, and she has reason to believe he might be Jaume.

The search for identity and dangers of seeking revenge runs through this beautifully crafted film. Rosales expertly weaves together multiple narrative threads to craft a richly complex and unpredictable melodrama of Greek tragedy proportions. Performances are uniformly excellent, particularly Bárbara Lennie, who memorably featured recently in Asghar Farhadi’s Everybody Knows.

In this clever debut, director Marta Díaz de Lope Díaz and her host of eccentric characters challenge traditional taboos with a fresh and funny perspective on female empowerment and patriarchy in the church.

Spanish television veteran Gloria Muñoz (The Unexpected Life) is Carmen, a devout Catholic woman from Malaga who is on the cusp of changing history to become the chosen leader of her local religious guild. However, her dream is all but crushed when her biggest rival is chosen: the ridiculous, arrogant Ignacio, who is also determined to prevent her from holding the post. When a comic twist of fate leaves Ignacio unconscious in Carmen’s home, she must make all attempts to keep him hidden while she receives a series of unexpected visitors. Yet, what at first seems like a terrible predicament may, in fact, be Carmen’s only chance to snatch back her dream.

This is a refreshing representation of the devoted Catholic middle-aged woman, with Muñoz’s wonderful performance bringing humour, humanity and a wicked edge to the role that entertains to the very end.

This is your chance to attend the most anticipated Australian film of the year, CAMINO SKIES! Featuring inspirational Queenslander Claude Tranchant and directed by Queenslander Noel Smyth & Kiwi Fergus Grady, this is the hopeful story documenting six Australians & Kiwi’s journey as they undertook the 800km Camino de Santiago in Spain in 2018.

Premiere Event Information:
Friday 9th August
Big Screen Cinemas Caloundra
6:30pm: Film starts
7:50pm: Q&A with Noel Smyth

Camino Skies – Film directed by Noel Smyth & Fergus Grady is the uplifting story about everyday people doing the extraordinary. The Camino forces pilgrims to defy their age and physical ability, while also acting as a catalyst for change.

Lola (Zaira Romero) and Carmen (Rosy Rodríguez), live on the outskirts of Madrid in a poor and fiercely Catholic gypsy community where a woman must marry very young, have children and wait upon her man until death do them part. It is at the local open-air market that the two girls first lock eyes, detonating an explosion of first love. This meeting opens the floodgates to what will prove a journey replete with as much unbridled emotion as repression. As their relationship unfolds with purity, innocence and intensity, Carmen and Lola will have to battle against a community that is determined to tear them apart with its strict traditions.

Bilbao-born writer-director Arantxa Echevarría is no stranger to documentaries, an attribute that makes her feature-length fiction debut feel both authentic and urgent. Fully immersing the audience in an unfamiliar environment replete with terrific performances featuring flamenco- Roma style music, Echevarría and her exceptional non-professional cast deliver an empathetic depiction of forbidden love in a repressive society. Carmen and Lola is inspiring, necessary and beautiful.