Thursday, 21 March
La Estanquera de Vallecas (The Tobacconist of Vallecas)
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Eloy de la Iglesia | 1987 | Spain | 106' | ENG subs
The tobacconist of Vallecas is a rare thing in the genre known as cine quinqui − the cinema made in the late 70s en 80s in Spain, often by real street criminals and heroin addicts, that portrayed the reality of the working class youth in the suburbs of the big cities. This film goes beyond the dramatic rawness of the Eloy de la Iglesia’s earlier works turning the miserable setting into a theatrical comedy and focusing on the potential solidarity between working-class people against evildoers much more dangerous than the junkie and the brat from el barrio.
José Luis Manzano, the young man, is the most unforgettable of the actors. He was an almost illiterate rascal who became De la Iglesia’s muse and the most famous quinqui actor. His life is dramatically linked to the fictions he played. Despite of the recognition he gained with cinema, he didn’t get over his heroin addiction and life of little crimes. A couple of years after this film, his last one, he ended up in prison and everyone turned his back on him. During permission, he died of an overdose.
La estanquera is the quinqui-film that has reached the biggest public in Spain. It has nevertheless never been premiered abroad and it will be showed in Cavia for the first time with English subtitles.
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- film