Arturo Pérez-Reverte‘s famous series of books comes to the big screen in Spain. My sister-in-law’s verdict: a bit convoluted and not always easy to know what is going on… Oh well, if you like slightly confusing historical masterpieces, here’s one to watch out for!
Pérez-Reverte is however a fine author who loves tangling with Spain’s complicated historical past. If you want to check out one of his novels in translation, The Fencing Master, a tale of political intrigue and wonderful sword fights in 19th Century Madrid, is a great place to start.
Viggo seems to speak pretty good spanish for an american. Looks like a good, all-around action flick.
He speaks spanish as a native because he spent his childhood in Argentina. He has worked with a dialect coach in order to get a castilian accent but his voice and accent sounds kind of artificial for me. I can hear, I could say, you can feel how he is fighting against his “porteño” accent as much as against all European armies together.
I’ve seen only the trailers you can get through internet and it looks like a good manufactured action film with the best grades on the technical subjects like photography, cinematography and so on. The critics are happy with the work of the actors even Viggo (despite of the accent) but they claim the authors did very bad on making only one film of the five Alatriste books.
It seems that the plot is not so easy to follow if you don’t know anything about the books of at least about the actual historical events that happend in the Siglo de Oro and what meant for Spain the conquest of America, the religion wars in Europe, the wealth and the misery of the empire, the glory of the arts and the darkness of the inquisition…
The producers could have done something like “The Lord of the Rings” or the films on Harry Potter but they have spent the whole ammunition in one shoot. I just hate the fact that they have hired Viggo in order to please non spanish speaking audiences.
On the other hand olé to them for doing it. If this film works, it might be the beginning of a whole range of expensive films on spanish history with a spanish view, in spanish and with hispanic actors.
I agree it’s a shame they didn’t use a Spanish actor, or make more of the books. By the way, thanks Londinense for passing us the info and link to the trailer originally
De nothing, Ben!
It’s too bad! There’s a long tradition of hispano-americans working in the spanish cinema and it usually work wonderfully. Gael García Bernal, for instance, did a fantastic job in “La mala educación” from Almodóvar.
I wonder how natural Nicole Kidman sounds as British in “The Hours”, American in “Eyes Wide Shut” or Australian in her Ozzie films. She might be a genius!
She actually does pretty well, though half the (male) audience wouldn’t mind if she was speaking in russian…
Exposición Alatriste
Con motivo del reciente estreno de la película ‘ALATRISTE’, (de
Agustín Díaz Yanes) se ha inaugurado “en la Plaza Mayor (Madrid)” una
exposición sobre “El Madrid de Alatriste, el Madrid del siglo de Oro”.
La exposición recorre las zonas de la ciudad en el siglo XVII. Está
dividida en distintos ámbitos:
* Se recorrerá el Madrid de la época por medio de cuadros, maquetas
y esculturas
* Fotografías del rodaje, contemplando además el vestuario original
de la película
* Poemas, leyendas y anécdotas del siglo de Oro, a través de un
paseo por el Plano de Texeira ( el más antiguo conocido de la capital)
“En la Casa de la Panedería (Plaza Mayor, Madrid) _hasta el 21 de
Octubre 2006_.”
Horario:
- De lunes a viernes: 10 – 140h y 16 – 20h
- Sábados, domingos y festivos: 10 – 14h