Amparo Soler Leal Movies

First-time director Samuel Benmchetrit's 2003 debut Janis et John (Janis and John) follows the comedic exploits of a down-on-his luck insurance salesman as he attempts to make up for some very poor financial decisions. Pablo Sterni (Sergi Lopez), the aforementioned insurance salesman, has, until recently, been an honest business man. As of late, though, Pablo had been siphoning money from one of his more successful client's accounts -- one that covers a very expensive sports car. When that client, Mr. Cannon (Jean-Louis Trintignant), turns in a loss claim for that car for a half-million francs, Pablo finds himself in a tight spot. Inspiration strikes when Pablo learns that his hippy-dippy cousin Leon (Christopher Lambert, billed as Christophe Lambert) has just inherited a million francs from his recently deceased father. Leon, a perpetually stoned record store owner, lives solely for the day his 1973 vision of John Lennon and Janis Joplin's Christ-like return to Earth is fulfilled. After visiting with his cousin, Pablo decides to assist Leon in reliving his dream -- as well as parting him with much of his inheritance -- by convincing his wallflower wife, Brigitte (Marie Trintignant, murdered mere weeks before the film's debut, thus marking her final film appearance) and an out-of-work actor (François Cluzet) to impersonate Janis and John. Janis et John was selected for inclusion in the 2003 Montreal World Film Festival. ~ Ryan Shriver, All Movie Guide

Set in the mid-1980s, this sitcom-like domestic comedy centers on a bright young man's endeavors to escape his crazy family life. Jorge's ordeal began when his recently-widowed mother Carmen moved herself, him and his brother Alvaro into her parent's comfortable but strange middle-class home. Their grandfather is a stern Francoist general suffering from alcoholism, memory loss and an earnest desire to launch a military coup. Their grandmother is stone deaf, domineering and has not spoken to her husband in years. Duli the maid never stops smiling. An introverted intellectual sort in his late teens, Jorge finds the situation difficult to accept. His rebellious brother Alvaro, who wants to be a Mod and turn Madrid into a riotous version of Brighton Beach during the mid- '60s, also hates it there, but as their mother is busily studying for her college degree, they have little choice. Jorge turns to stealing money from his increasingly forgetful grandfather in order to escape the crazy household. While Jorge busily makes himself rich, the grandfather somehow manages to pull off his coup. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Antonio (Jose M. Sacristan) is a vagabond traveler who hitches a ride into a small town. He takes a job in a restaurant before landing a better job in the local movie theater. Antonio remembers the owner as the woman who employed his acting troupe years before when he was a young child. He later gets mixed up in a plot to steal a valuable painting from a convent. The English title of Cara de Acelga is Spinach Face. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide

Filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar, the Luis Buñuel of the 1980s, cooks up another perversely funny descent into urban hell in What Have I Done to Deserve This? Carmen Maura plays a middle-class housewife hemmed in by her wildly eccentric relatives. Her principal purpose in life is a balancing act: to keep her head fastened on securely while all others are losing theirs. Film buffs will have a field day toting up Almodóvar's visual and verbal allusions to the works of Buñuel, Brian De Palma, Billy Wilder, John Waters, and even Andy Warhol. What Have I Done to Deserve This? was originally titled ¿Que He Hecho Yo Para Merecer Esto? ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this inconclusive, confusing story about an aristocratic Majorcan family with connections to the Pope and much more darkly, to the secrets of a Masonic Order kept in a doll's room, the patriarch of the family (Fernando Rey) and his wife and cousin come to no good end for reasons that are never very clear. The entire story is told in flashbacks by the patriarch's son, who also has connections to the Catholic Church. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This is the third film in a sequence that started in 1978, about the Marquis de Leguineches, his hopeless son Luis José, his mistress/servant Viti, and in this instance, a Catholic priest. The Marquis has been living in Madrid since he lost his villa, and when his father-in-law dies, the family gets together and that becomes a catalyst for thinking more directly about their future. This leads to the Marquis' decision to leave Spain with the family's money, yet it will be difficult to cross the border without having their wealth confiscated by the authorities. So the Marquis fakes a broken leg and stashes the wealth inside his cast on a journey to Lourdes to seek a miracle. Unfortunately, France is no more amenable than Spain to the wealthy aristocracy since Mitterand's socialist government has just been elected into power. Between his unwieldy cast, the crazy family members, and the problem of where to go next to keep his fortune intact, the Marquis has a rough time of it. The repartée among the Marquis' family members and friends will entertain most audiences, but the originality of the 1978 family has worn thin by now and will be difficult to stretch into yet another episode in the future. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

A Marquis (Luis Escobar) suddenly becomes inspired to reclaim his palace, now gone to seed, right in the heart of Madrid. He and his son head for the city, without taking into account that his wife, the aged Marquesa is thoroughly ensconsed in the palace, has been for more than 40 years, and has no intention of leaving. In order to settle the issue, the Marquis decides to get his wife committed - not an unreasonable proposition given the fact that she has preferred to stay in bed all these years. Variously eccentric characters pop in and out of the palace as the Marquis tries to implement his plan, without much success. The Marquesa, in turn, manages to force him and her former lover into a duel in the garden and pulls out a shotgun to put them out of their misery and her life. Things backfire, so to speak, and the Spanish State comes into the picture, perhaps it will have more success where its old - very old - aristocracy has failed to measure up. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Few sacred cows go un-gored in this satirical Spanish movie. In Spain, as in England, instead of getting together over a round of golf, it is customary for the power elite to gather at a country estate for a long weekend of "hunting," which basically consists of standing in one spot shooting at game which is being driven toward the hunters. Between shots, the elite converse. In the story, a Catalan businessman pays an impoverished nobleman for the use of his country estate and its game. He is hosting this party to win the goodwill of a group of investors whom he hopes will back one of his schemes. Sprinkled among the businessmen are some more twisted types, every one of them a genuine aristocrat or the member of some government or other -- even a dictator in exile from his Latin American country. A powerful but disapproving priest surveys the scene with outspoken scorn. When the businessman learns that he has backed the wrong horse, and that a new government is being formed, he scrambles to curry favor with those few of his guests who are part of the next group to come to power. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Aurora (Ana Belen) is a high-school teacher. When two attractive men fall in love with her, she enjoys their attention. One of them is a young student of hers (Jaime Gamboa), the other is a man returning from his many years of exile following the Spanish Civil War (Fernando Fernan Gomez). Her gentle and wise handling of these two fragile hearts gives this story its focus. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide