Benjamin Benhamou Movies
- 1985
This entertaining comedy is set in 1938 during the Spanish Civil War when a group of Republican soldiers sneak into a village in enemy territory to steal a bull with plans of butchering it to feed themselves. Fate and the bull itself, however, have other plans. One of the surreptitious bull-snatchers knows the village well -- he grew up there, but that advantage alone cannot guarantee their success, as it turns out. The group of five would-be thieves dress themselves in uniforms of the Nationalist troops in an attempt to dissimulate their true identity. But instead of a neat getaway with a bull in tow, they are caught up in the "correo" or running of the bull, they get involved in a religious procession, and in the end, watch as the bull breaks out of a flimsy ring in a bullfight and heads for the hills. Still hungry, the group of men now have to worry about getting back to their own battalion before they are found out. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Guillermo Montesinos, Alfredo Landa, (more)
- 1984
In his second successful starring role in 1983, Agustín Gonzalez is a father who runs a wine shop in Madrid, a city under a three-year siege (1936-1939) because the Nationalists forces of Francisco Franco need to take Madrid before the fascist dictator can be installed in power. The siege has left the Madrileños with very little food, living under the threat of bombs, and worrying about the prospects of defeat. It is the sense of impending disaster, of hunger and deprivation that is oddly missing from this cinematic interpretation of the play by Fernando Fernán Gómez. The daughter in the family (Victoria Abril) enters into a love affair with a soldier and ends up having a baby, the son (Gabino Diego) is coming of age with the maid - and life seems to go on with all its proverbial ups and downs. But without the sharp dialogue of the play itself, this film is not as tautly strung, or as convincingly real as the stage production. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Amparo Soler Leal, Agustin Gonzalez, (more)
