José M. Sacristán Movies

Life and love provides the focus for this Spanish comedy which focuses upon four couples. Pablo, a pessimist, has a new lover. His relationship is very similar to the relationships of his three friends. Though they are all dissatisfied with their mates, none of the possess the courage to change their situations. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Adolfo Aristarain and Alberto Lecchi wrote this South American western in which sheep-herders battle a ruthless landowner. ~ Nicole Gagne, All Movie Guide

Carmen (Mercedes Sampietro) is a puzzle to all the people who surround her: her parents, her grown son, and a charming literature professor. They cannot understand how she can prefer solitude to being in their company. Her work certainly thrives in solitude, as she is a restorer of old paintings. She is content to care for one of her infant grandchildren and a new puppy in splendid isolation. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Spain, having suffered a civil war in the 1930s, was a neutral country during World War II. Generalissimo Francisco Franco (Juan Echanove) was the sole ruler of what was then deliberately fashioned into a puritanical society. In this satire, the hypocrisy of Madrid society in that period is scathingly portrayed. Those familiar with the period first-hand are likeliest to understand the story's allusions and symbolism. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

This wacky comedy depicts a single day in and around the set of a movie on the Spanish Civil War being filmed in a working class Madrid neighborhood. Paloma, (Ana Belen), a bored housewife with a husband who is too concerned about being exploited by "the ruling classes" to work, must evade the romantic advances of an unattractive fishmonger, and cope with the attentions the male lover of a homosexual fascist is showering on her daughter. Meanwhile, she engages in a tryst with the equally bored fading film star Luis Doncel (Juan Luis Gallardo). Everyone on the set is waiting for the director to show up, but he's too heavily involved in a domestic dispute to work. Meanwhile, a series of strikes has brought Madrid to a virtual standstill. Director/co-writer Jose Luis Garcia Sanchez manages to satirize virtually every aspect of contemporary Spanish society, as well as relationships between the sexes. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

The spirit, hopes, and failures of a troupe of itinerant performers in the 1950s create a poignant, humorous leitmotif in this drama by Fernando Fernan-Gomez. The story of the wandering players is told in flashbacks, as Carlos Galvan (Jose M. Sacristan) reminisces about the good times while under therapy with a psychiatrist in a senior citizens' home. Carlos and his lover Juanita (Laura del Sol), his teenage son, his father, and a few other actors try to eke out a living by putting on shows in small towns and villages. No one has very much money, but life is lived to the hilt, and Carlos himself has some pretty tall tales. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

This ostensible comedy about the affairs or non-existent affairs of television executive Federico José Sacristán and his actress wife Elena Victoria Abril) is almost as hard to believe as director Manuel Gutiérrez-Aragón's previous effort Feroz. Federico convinces a friend to attempt to seduce his wife in order to test her fidelity. She passes the test, but her husband is not satisfied, and so he asks his boss to seduce her. Events conspire to lead the boss in another direction -- it turns out he is more interested in a transvestite who is actually the secret lover of Federico, and the boss seduces him instead. Meanwhile, Elena is acting in a production of Don Juan in which two of her supposed lovers are playing her lovers -- and the story continues downhill from there. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Director Gonzalo Suárez wrote this sequel to his 1967 film Ditirambo in which the lead character has a friend and fellow writer named Rocabruno (Francisco Rabal) who struggles with writer's block on a grand scale. Ditirambo (José Sacristán) has more enthusiasm than his friend, and unflinchingly prods and pushes to get the blocked ink flowing again. Just as in the earlier film, and in Suárez' book on these characters, there is no clear line between reality and fantasy, no logical plot, quite a few skits that illustrate the two writers' imaginations, and a bit of humor. The off-beat nature of this somewhat experimental movie may not be for all audiences though Suárez garnered a cult following for the first Ditirambo film. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Bernabe (José Sacristán) works as an artistic director for a publicity firm but his avocation is fawning after his bosses, sleeping with whomever might advance his career, and ignoring his wife. Life continues on in this vein until he meets a young model whom he invites up to his boss's temporarily vacant country house, pretending the house belongs to him. Not very far away, bulldozers and other machinery are clearing the beautifully wooded area so construction can start on an amusement park. Little does Bernabe realize that his potential new conquest is a seriously fanatical environmental advocate, and she arrives at the house with friends, gets Bernabe high and "out of it," and then she and her friends proceed to trash the construction machinery. Once Bernabe comes around again, he finds out what has happened, loses heart for his planned sexual escapade, and begins to appreciate his wife for the first time. Life hardly gets any better -- it turns out his long-suffering wife has fallen in love with someone from his office and she has left him. Bernabe should be sufficiently chastened to mend his ways, but will these setbacks, or any setbacks, be enough to alter his behavior? ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Based on a 1943 book of the same title by Camilo José Cela, Colmena features the comings and goings of a wide variety of characters, all trying to survive in a poverty-stricken Madrid during World War II. Rather than feature any single story line, these people from all walks of life cross paths almost randomly as they come to a café to sip their one cup of coffee and work on a book, or pick up a prostitute, or get their shoes shined, or play billiards, or just warm themselves on a cold winter's day. This primary setting is complemented by a brothel where a dirt-poor journalist sleeps if there is a room available that night, while during the day he tries to make ends meet one way or another. The demeanor of the people in the café or in the brothel effectively conveys the atmosphere of a long-lost era that may have had hardships but also brought a subtle sense of camaraderie to very disparate human beings. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Roberto Orbea (Jose M. Sacristan) is a Spanish socialist politician who used to be a lawyer. In the film, which is almost completely told in "flashbacks," he reminisces about his recent life. Despite many years of hiding his political beliefs, he is imprisoned and realizes while in prison that he is genuinely homosexual. All along, he has tried to put his sexuality aside, and he married a woman who shares his political beliefs. Even after his release at the end of the Franco era, he tries to avoid expressing his homosexuality, but eventually he and his wife set up a menage a trois with Juanito (Jose Luis Alonzo), a rough young adolescent who is probably a hustler. Featuring an appearance of the renowned director Juan Antonio Bardem, this film raised an outcry at the time of its first release for its explicit depiction of homosexual acts and for its outspokenly pro-Marxist political statements. The film also gained notoriety because it appears to tell the story of several well-known figures in Spanish society. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide