With The Electric Cinema in Birmingham sadly remaining shut,I finally got round to visiting the indie cinema HOME in Manchester and having a joyful time viewing their Viva! Cinema of Latin America festival.
Holding a Horror festival on the big screen as most others moved online in 2020, I booked for the first of their two day celebration of Narciso Ibanez Serrador,which whilst offering a nice chance to see the wonderful The House That Screamed (1969) at the cinema, most excited me by a extremely rare screening a subtitled episode of Serrador's TV series.
Note:Review contains some spoilers.
View on the episode:
Limited to just one day of filming (!) writer/director Narciso Ibanez Serrador brings surrealist stylisation to the macabre atmosphere, drawing the street, cars and phones in felt tip on cardboard that the cast carry around.
Made just a few years before he turned to Horror on the big screen, Serrador reveals a sharp eye for witty comedic set-pieces,panning the camera down the long queues of the public waiting to meet local government, and gliding upwards to the local judges spending 100's of years to decide cases.
Claimed in interviews after that he spent 18 hours in the hole so all shots could be done,Narciso Ibanez Menta gives a dandy of a performance as Sir XX, whose fear of being trapped is mixed with a deadpan comedic delivery asking for help from the locals.
Sinking into asphalt, the screenplay by Serrador adapts Carlos Buiza's with a satirical glee at the inept performance of local government, which bubbles to a wicked Horror sting as Sir XX is left on the road.