Torrente: El brazo tonto de la ley

This was movie of the year in Spain in 1998 following Ulloas success with Airbag the year before. It's about a truly revolting cop in Madrid. He's a sexist,egotistical,dirty pig. There are some memorable scenes in the film and it's quite funny if you don't have any problems with political correctness. It's probably more fun to a Spanish audience who get the jokes about Atlético Madrid fans, "in" expressions and other national references. A Spanish viewer can also appreciate all the cameos. Some of Spain's most renowned actors appear in little parts and add an extra twist to it all. The pace of the movie is fast and there are no dull moments. Go and see it if you can but have a couple of beers before you go.

This movie is a killer! One of the funniest ever! If you like Farelly brothers's work, this will overpass everything they've done by far! Great stuff! If you see this film once you will feel that you need to see it at least one more time! Of course, you'll need to have the stomach for this kind of jokes! The other characters, Rafi and his two friends are also extremely funny! But cannot overpass Torente! Also,you have to see the sequel! An absolute killer!! I laughed so hard at this movie, that I actually cried!!! These friends of his are so stupid and cheesy, that almost all the parts with them will make your laughter hard to take! As I said, when you'll think you had enough, it comes back, bigger, longer and uncut! If you like humor and especially black and somewhat racist and apparently dumb humor, it's a must! Go see it dudes! It's all worth!

Being Spanish as I am I find this movie amazingly funny (i've watched it a million times :P). But I must admit it might not be as funny for everyone, if you're not Spanish you'll probably find it quite stupid and boring, why? Because many of the jokes are referred to things everyone in Spain knows about but people from other parts of the world don't, some of the characters are quite... infamous in Spain and that makes them funny... and many other details as these. Torrente is something of a Spanish Homer Simpson / Peter Griffin, and everyone finds those characters funny because everyone knows quite a lot about the US and American celebrities, but with Spain... I'd say not.

Beware this comedy isn't palatable to all taste, but after watched it firstly on TV cable and stayed disoriented for a while, such foolishness, anyhow it was so fresh and inventive, an anti-hero character, who have countless bad behaviors, drunkard, racist, disgusting, filthy, obscene, we can thing the worst thing that he will be fits perfectly, however he hooked the audience in such shallow ground, Torrente is fantastic and deliberately bad to catch us toward him, in fact the viewers in such environment don't mind anymore, it's just a black comedy, we realize that it is a farce, then who care what's coming to next, so Santiago Segura conceived a harmless, but appealing character, in fact amazed us entirely, even politically incorrect to nowadays patterns, great box office in Spain that spread to the world!!!

Resume:

First watch: 2009 / How many: 2 / Source: Cable TV-DVD / Rating: 7.5

Spanish auteur Santiago Segura, who wrote, directed and stars in this film, creates a decent if overly dark comedy about corruption. Segura claims to be a member of the Madrid police force, but his outlandish behavior – he drinks before going on duty and forces his wheelchair-bound father to beg to increase his income – hardly demonstrates the qualities required of a representative of the law. When sleazy nymphomaniac Neus Asensi moves in next door, he befriends her cousin, extremely nerdy Javier Cámara. When Segura and his new sidekick accidentally discover a drug ring run through a Chinese restaurant, Cámara calls in his loser friends to help. As the cast gets significantly reduced in a flurry of bullets and tragedy, Segura concludes the film with a few plot twists and the unsettling suggestion that sometimes people are as bad as they seem. An inherently unfunny story gets injected with a dose of morbid wit through Segura's approach to the characters. His attitude toward humanity appears quite dark. Everyone in the film either takes advantage of others or finds himself exploited, and no one seems to wind up punished for their wrongdoings. True, a number of maniacal drug dealers get offed, but so do all of Cámara's awkward, endearing friends. Segura follows few conventions in his portrayal of the world of his deluded cop. Chus Lampreave, familiar from several of Pedro Almodóvar's films, has a nice role as Cámara's mother.