Crimen ferpecto

Rafael Gonzalez (Guillermo Toledo), is a salesman in the ladies section of a fashionable department store in Madrid who has it all: good looks, a sharp wardrobe, and a confident, brash manner that allows him to get his way with women and in the workplace.

Rafael has clear goals, too, the most important of which is to lead a "perfect life," and little patience for anybody who settles for less. Such a proud man, of course, is perfectly set up to take a fall and Rafael plunges very far indeed in this hilarious black comedy by Spanish director Alexis de la Iglesia.

Rafael's slide begins when a hated rival, Don Antonio (Luis Varlea), wins a coveted promotion. An argument follows and Don Antonio ends up dead. Rafael's role in the accident goes undetected by the police only because Lourdes (Monica Cevera), an unattractive coworker he has long ignored, helps dispose of the corpse.

Lourdes assistance comes with a price. She has long carried a torch for Rafael and uses the threat of police exposure to get her own "perfect life." She insists Rafael become her lover, meet her parents, and marry her. In short, Rafael is about to be trapped in the kind of dull, mediocre existence he has always mocked.

Watching Rafael try to escape from the world Lourdes plans for him – raising children in a badly decorated suburban apartment filled with clown paintings and spending evenings collecting ugly miniatures -- provides lots of laughter and entertainment and plenty of insights into contemporary Spain. In the end, each character gets what they want – but as usually happens in life itself – there is a clear winner and loser. Highly recommended.

9/10

This Spanish film, Crimen Ferpecto, doesn't sound so appealing based on its fairly typical plot. Rafael, a women's department manager at a Spanish clothing store, is a womanizer concerned only with his own personal advancement and achieving what he believes to be a perfect life, is thwarted by Lourdes, a sales clerk in the same store, and a rather unattractive woman, blackmails Rafael into a relationship, after discovering a secret Rafael cannot have revealed.

However, I was pleasantly surprised at how often I laughed out loud. Crimen Ferpecto moves at a fairly quick pace with lots of entertaining situations.

First off, both Guillermo Toledo, as Rafael, and Monica Cervera, as Lourdes are convincing in their portrayals. What makes their performances enjoyable is their mutual ability to create interesting dynamics within their characters. Rafael, is, essentially a boorish lout, yet Toledo manages to make him sympathetic at times especially as his entanglement with Lourdes get more and more complicated. By the same token, Lourdes, the "ugly" sales clerk, proves, as a twist on the character type, to be just as ugly on the inside. They are constantly sparring, as Lourdes tries to rope Rafael into marriage, and he tries to remove her from his life. While amusing, the sparring, as the film reaches its climax, does get a little wearing. The first half of Crimen Ferpecto working better then the latter half.

Also, a standout is Luis Varela as Don Antonio, Rafael's rival in becoming store manager. Without giving too much away of the plot, his character gets a surreal treatment and haunts Rafael as he attempts to deal with Lourdes. I thought some of the interplay between Rafael and Don Antonio were among the best in the film.

Crimen Ferpecto is light entertainment at it's best. It offers some genuinely funny moments that are well conceived and executed. Guillermo Toledo and Monica Cervera also give stand out performances in their roles as Rafael and Lourdes with Luis Varela, as Don Antonio, backing them up admirably.

Now, this movie is not going to mark the history of dark comedy cinema, but believe me it's waaay better than a whole lot of stuff that has been strewn around by USA, French and Italian makers lately. The pacing is fast, well kept though with a few ludicrously foreseeable passages; the cast is really good in painting the characters, almost all of them well performed and denoted, in landscaping the interpersonal relations and the working environment, in adding the zest of surreality which makes the good of the movie but -at the same time- avoiding the downfall into clownesque. Indeed, there is a clear directorial decision to remove this movie from the "credibility" section, to the surreal/grand-guignol/grotesque side, but the operation is successful, if you do not mind...and if you know where the "FerPecto" inversion comes from, then you'll enjoy it. The very end is indeed below the expectations that the plot built, but you won't guess it in advance.

It's hilarious. It's poignant. It's artistic. It's even philosophical at times. I can't imagine anyone not liking this film. "Crimen ferpecto" is a great surrealistic comedy along the lines of "Being John Malkovich", "One Night at McCools" or even the masterpiece "Brazil".

The plot begins bizarre, and from there it gets ever bizarrer. Set in a department store (the perfect metaphor for the human condition!), this film brilliantly weaves the themes of glamorous/plastic life versus the mundane/real. Trapped between worlds and desperately trying to achieve the former is our hero Rafael, a man whose entire life exists within the ladies' clothing department. Somehow he gets wrapped up in murder, blackmail and ectoplasmic visitations from lovable corpses. Yeah, I told you it gets bizarre.

But despite the zany plot, there's a very poignant & sober message that runs just below the surface. It's subtle, but it comes to fruition during the magnificent climax when we realize exactly what this whole wacky movie is about. If you've paid attention to symbolism, metaphor, allegory and all that intellectual jazz, you'll get it, and you'll see how everything fits into place. If not, fine, you'll enjoy the picture anyway because it's just plain funny. The beauty is that you can take it at your own pace. Great film. Damn near perfect. Er... ferpect.

I Just can't get enough of this. I watched this movie alone the first time, then I showed it to my flat mates. Now I'm looking forward to the next time friends visit me so I can watch this movie again with them.

The thing I liked most about this movie was the extremely smooth way of telling the story. As the movie started, I almost immediately got sucked into the story by the hypnotic, yet very funny way of displaying the plot. Not only the script or the acting, but also camera, light, sound and editing - all aspects of the movie presentation where thoughtfully placed and dozed to make up the right mix for a really well made movie.

The way of telling the story is almost a story for itself. The sequence of the scenes performs twists of its own, the way they are filmed and edited adds a whole new level, a sub plot so to speak. The scene presentation, the "image", plays an important role and I'd say it's the most grave factor that makes this movie unique.

The pace of the movie (regarding the story telling style, not the plot itself) slows down towards the end to leaves space for more roughness and suspense.

I really hope to see much more of Alex del la Iglesia in the future because what I got to see yet is always getting even better.

8 out of 10.