Age of Monster

... pero es infumable, te la vendan como te la vendan es una película horrenda aburrida y hasta bastante estúpida por pretenciosa.

A famous quote from Gramsci opens the film: "The old world is dying, the new world is slow to appear and in that chiaroscuro monsters emerge." The story begins when the film director Víctor (Javier Cámara) and his wife Clara (Pilar Castro) summon their usual troupe of collaborators to their luxury mansion: Marta (Carmen Machi), the screenwriter Raúl (Julián López), his partner and artist Virginia (Yael Barnatán) and the actress Andrea (Cándela Peña), who appears with her current boyfriend, Jorge (Jorge Monje), a dental mechanic. Marta and Fabián also serve in the house, a duo that manages the home and the stay of its inhabitants with the greatest of distances, and who has a certain control of all situations. But Víctor is really sick, and before dying he wants to make one last film, which Raúl and he have previously developed on the scripted role. These first scenes, in which the director and screenwriter work on the presentation of the characters, contain what will be the first of the many narrative liberties that the Canarian filmmaker takes and set the tone of what awaits us in just over 90 minutes of footage.

This is a dry, heavy and labyrinthine drama in its depiction of illness and genetic inheritance as a great fear in the life of a person who suddenly becomes mortally ill. This complex and tiresome story titled 'The Time of Monsters' is dedicated to a patient for whom the meaning of "cinema within cinema" falls short because it takes a deeper and more twisted turn. A film of continuous dialogue that addresses a bitter description of the illness, the meaning of death and the professional life of a filmmaker until the last minute. But the film makes little sense and perhaps it is essential to try to fully understand the stated proposal, to proceed to a new vision, something difficult to achieve after a single viewing, but for my part I am not going to do this because the story turns out to be frankly bored. That is why it is noted from the outset that the text that follows is a kind of outline, here Félix Sabroso takes risks like never before, and that is always praiseworthy, but the results are incomprehensible and unusual and the labyrinthine development turns it into a disconcerting puzzle that neither even the most intelligent spectator who seeks to face such a challenge can unravel. Javier Cámara stars, giving a good performance, as usual, playing a director who claims to have shot several films that he has not been able to release, gathering his most faithful collaborators around his deathbed to present the work posthumous of him. He is well accompanied by a good group of performers, some of the best in Spanish cinema, such as: Candela Peña, Pilar Castro, Carmen Machi, Julián López, Secun de la Rosa, and brief appearances by Antonia San Juan and Pepón Nieto.

After Dunia's death, Sabroso's incessant work as a filmmaker is swept away by a breath of desolation and he then shoots this project five months later, a tribute to cinema and those who make it, and those who live it; 'Cinema within Cinema'. Because that is broadly the plot of 'The Time of the Monsters', cinema that is life and life according to the rules of cinema. In addition to being the moment where one of the maxims of this entire story is verbalized: "what matters is the end." A surprising new work by Félix Sabroso, who life has forced him to make his solo debut after a lifetime sharing work with Dunia Ayaso, who died that year and to whom the film is dedicated. After initially delighting in the wildest and most witty comedy, the duo Sabroso and Ayaso evolved their vision, refining the stories until letting the dramatic make an appearance. After the brilliant Descongélate (2003) and the outstanding comedy-drama The Naked Years (2008), came The Interior Island (2009), this reflective film was professionally written and directed by Dunia Ayaso and Félix Sabroso. This couple of expert directors in comedy made their sixth film a pure drama, although they had already hinted at this change with their previous film, the comedy-drama ¨Los Años Desnudos¨, also starring Candela Peña. They collaborated very actively on various films, forming a very close couple both as scriptwriters and directors until the recent death of Dunia Ayaso. They made some attractive comedies, such as: The Scream in the Sky, Defrost! , I'm sorry, pretty, but Lucas loved me, The Naked Years, Ugly. His best film being: The Interior Island (2009), which turns out to be a strong drama, a groundbreaking film in its style but that advances with overwhelming force, obtaining several awards and nominations. Rating 'The Time of Monsters' (2015): 4/10. Below average, only for stubborn lovers of Spanish cinema. Only the photography by David Azcano, the music by Daniel Belardinelli and the luxurious house where the peculiar out-of-the-ordinary events take place stand out.