7 años

Imagine you are one of four partners of a highly successful technology firm. Imagine that you become frustrated with the government spending of your hard-earned tax money in your country, Spain, and decide to overcome the problem by committing tax fraud and stashing away millions in secure Swiss accounts. Now, the Spanish tax authorities smell a rat and are about to pounce on your clandestine accounts et al. You are all certain to go to jail for at least seven years. But. There is a way out. If one of you takes the fall, not all need to be imprisoned. One can save the other three.

How do you decide who makes the sacrifice?

This is the premise of the hot-off-the-press drama 7 Años. It premiered on the 28th of October, and thank you Netflix for bringing us this first original European Spanish production.

So, the four friends and business partners are Luis, Veronica, Marcel, and Carlos. Rather astutely, they hire a mediator to help them solve their conundrum. (Jose the mediator has a rather thorny task, obviously, but he's offered a cushy sum for his troubles.) The very fact that the four have hired him at all tells us something about them, and as we progress in this tight 77-minute drama, we see more and more of these characters.

Read full review at: https://devikamenon.blogspot.com/2016/11/foreign-movie-friday-7- anos.html

This drama is very much in the style of 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf'. Instead of a mid western college, this film is set in the office of a Spanish company. The four founders of the company are in deep trouble, all of them about to go to jail for tax evasion. However, there might be a way out, if one of them can take the fall and go to prison for seven years, then the rest can be saved.

The four founders hire a mediator to help them work through this dilemma. The founders are three handsome men and a beautiful female CFO. All are young, clever and persuasive. The mediator is the perfect foil, old, short, plain looking and slightly withdrawn. Over the course of the film, the founders tear each other apart whilst the mediator gently moves them towards a conclusion. A truly gripping drama. The only draw back for a non-English speaker is that the dialog is so complex and the speech so rapid fire, that sometimes it is hard read all the sub-title.

A great film, almost certain to be done over by Hollywood, watch it before it is ruined!

Business as usual ... except when you get caught doing something you are not allowed to do. Usually you then have to suffer the consequences. Unless you decide that someone could sacrifice themselves to save others. And that is the overall premise here. Although as you can imagine no one is willing to take the fall like that.

So this drama/thriller is playing out in one location and therefor has to have something more going for it, twists and character traits, people clashing with each other. And overall the tension is kept throughout with moods swinging, opinions changing and views deceived. It works nicely, but it's not the very best out there. Still to be able to watch this so closely to its release in Spain in another country (also on Netflix) is kind of nice

This is a take of '12 Angry Men' with one room and character's personalities and hidden secrets come out. I give the director props for maintaining a level of intensity throughout the file. A few other details(like knowing what the company did, or any visual backstory of the characters) lessen the level of empathy I wanted to have for anyone. The ending is what pushed this from being a 6 to a 4, does not satisfy the movie.

7 Años (Spanish Translation: 7 Years) (2018) Director: Roger Gual Watched: 3/24/19 Rating: 4/5

Powwow futile, compelling confronting, mediating, voting one-location chamber piece Negotiation

(Didactic) Cinquain poetry applies the word count scheme 1-2-3-4-1. More specifically, 1 noun in the first line that serves as the title, then 2 adjectives, 3 verbs ending in "-ing", a 4 word phrase (another option is a full sentence with more than 4 words), and, finally, 1 synonym or more specific word for the title. Title Meaning: Four close friends and co-owners of a successful company must face the music with the IRS- by choosing one amongst themselves to be the fall guy (or gal) to serve the mandated 7 year prison sentence. How will they decide and who will it be? #Cinquain #DidacticCinquain #PoemReview #crime #onelocation #Spanish