Joaquín Climent Movies

Director/screenwriter Tristan Ulloa teams with co-director David Ulloa to adapt author Santiago Roncaglielo Alfaguare's novel about the tenderness of family relationships. Stuck in the throes of a mid-life crisis, middle-aged wife and mother Julia suddenly finds her woes compounded when her own mother dies and her marriage begins to fall apart. It seems that the troubles between Julia and her husband Juan are having a detrimental effect on the rest of the family as well. Their youngest child Sergio may have been adopted, yet the further that Julia and Juan drift apart the further Sergio drifts into a fantasy world of make believe. Sergio's older sister Marisa detests her younger brother almost as much as she detests her own body, and as puberty finally kicks in the young girl does her best to adapt to her sexual orientation. Of course no adult wants to depend on their children for support, but this is exactly what has happened in the case of Grandpa Salvador. In the evenings, when the family gathers around the dinner table, the atmosphere grows, the atmosphere in the house grows increasingly dense with each passing day. Perhaps sometime soon one member of the family will summon the courage to address the issue. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Miguel Bardem's Christmas comedy Noche de Reyes (Twelfth Night) intercuts a variety of story lines. Ernesto Cuspineda (Joaquin Climent) is a businessman whose life comes unglued during a party. His wife learns of his affair, and his daughter is expecting a baby. There are wise men who have nefarious motives, and scam artist Santa Clauses. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

Veteran Spanish director Luis Garcia Berlanga created this anarchic black comedy about sexual impotence and millennial anxiety. Though a Paris-based plastic surgeon spends much of his time and wealth on prostitutes, he is plagued by impotence. Despondent, he plans to commit suicide. After happening upon a bike with "Paris-Timbuktu" painted on it, he decides to bike from France to Africa and kill himself there on New Year's Eve. But when his plans are thwarted in Spain by a painful boil on his bottom, he is forced to room with a pair of sisters in a remote village. Through them, he finds himself increasingly immersed in the local community, populated by the likes of a clergyman suspected of murder, a nudist garage mechanic, and a bizarre champion cyclist. Paris-Timbuktu was screened at the 1999 Montreal Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Carlos Saura, one of the finest and most distinctive filmmakers in the Spanish cinema, wrote and directed this biographical epic concerning one of Spain's greatest artists, the painter Francisco de Goya y Lucientes. On his deathbed, Goya (Francisco Rabal), attended by his mistress, Leocadia (Eulalia Ramon) and their daughter, Rosario (Dafne Fernandez), is plagued by hallucinations and frequent visions of the beautiful Cayetana (Maribel Verdu) as his mind reels through the events of his life. As a young man, Goya (played in his younger days by Jose Coronado) became the court painter to King Charles and the Royal Family, where he created technically skillful but uninteresting portraits and was invited to a number of royal functions. At one such affair, Goya first met Cayetana, the Duchess of Alba, and he was immediately smitten; they became lovers, and she was both the subject and inspiration of several major works, including "Desnuda" and "La Maja Vestida." Goya's work developed a dark undercurrent after Napoleon invaded Spain and he took up with Leocadia, creating disturbing images that alienated his patrons and frightened his children. In time, the decline of the court and a changing political climate forced Goya to seek exile in France in 1824, where he would die four years later. Goya In Bordeaux was a project that Saura had dreamed of filming for years, and he was ably assisted in recreating the look of Goya's paintings by master cinematographer Vittorio Storaro. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi