Luis Hostalot Movies

French writer/director Bernard Rapp (Une Affaire de Goût) creates a neo-fable, of sorts, with his 2003 film, Pas Si Grave (No Big Deal). About a quarter of a century ago, Spanish artist Pablo (director Alejandro Jodorowsky) and his musician wife, Pilar (Pascale Roberts), escaped their native country and its civil war for sanctuary in Belgium. Shortly after arriving in their new home, the couple adopted three five-year-old boys from different ethnic backgrounds and raised them to become artists in their own right. Now grown, Charlie (Sami Bouajila), Max (Jean-Michel Portal), and Leo (Romain Duris) are brought together by their father, who has begun to feel his age and now spends a fair amount of time pondering how much longer he has to live. In an attempt to bring his sons closer together, Pablo gives them a mission: travel to Spain and steal a famous and well-guarded bust of the Virgin Mary and return it to Belgium. Immediately complying, the men set about to accomplish their assignment, while managing to truly get to know each other in the process. No Big Deal was a participating film at the 2003 New York Film Festival. ~ Ryan Shriver, Rovi

A death in the family brings a man back to his family and his hometown in this drama. After his brother Alex (David Recha) goes missing under hazy circumstances, Pau (David Selvas) gets the bad news that Alex has died after a successful suicide attempt. Pau travels to the village in Spain's Pyrenees mountains where he was born to break the sad news to his mother Merce (Alicia Oroxco); hoping to spare her feelings at a difficult time, he tells her that Alex was killed in an auto accident. As Merce mourns the death of her son, she and Pau set out to find Alex's friends and acquaintances and tell them of his sad fate. In their travels, they encounter Sara (Marieta Orozco), Alex's girlfriend, who planned to move away to the city with him; Emil (Luis Hostalot), an engineer who will be putting a highway through the town; Marta (Nathalie Boutefeu), Emil's daughter; and Toni (Juan Marquez), one of Emil's co-workers. Circumstances bring Pau and Marta together again when Emil disappears, and Marta finds herself searching for her father. Pau I El Seu Germa was the second feature from director Marc Recha, who won international acclaim with his debut, El Arbol De Las Cerezas. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

This plodding romantic drama concerns two people trying to cope with the political changes in post-Franco Spain. Begona (Angeli Van Os) is a beautiful law professor who meets the prosperous government official Juan (Didier Flamand) at a left-wing political rally. He pursues her, and Begonia eventually falls for Juan. Heated political discussions always precede their passionate love making. A government agent with a compromising picture of the amorous duo convinces Juan that Begona is a KGB agent, and Juan is blackmailed into negotiating with Basque terrorists with headquarters in Paris and Brussels. Juan discovers he has been fooled when his Basque contact is assassinated. Unsure if she is really a spy, Juan prepares to sacrifice everything for love. Begona is slowly drawn to the prosperous comfortable lifestyle that Juan can afford and fears she is losing her political passion. ~ Dan Pavlides, Rovi

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, Rovi