El cielo abierto (2001)

User Rating:

7.6/10   

Director:

Miguel Albaladejo

Writers:

Miguel Albaladejo (writer)
Elvira Lindo (writer)

Release Date:

2 February 2001 (Spain)

Genre:

Comedy | Romance

Plot:

Miguel, a young psychiatrist working in Madrid, learns that his wife has just dumped him for no one...

Awards:

9 wins & 3 nominations

Cast

Sergi López	...	Miguel
Mariola Fuentes	...	Jasmina
María José Alfonso	...	Elvira
Emilio Gutiérrez Caba	...	David
Geli Albaladejo	...	Carola
Marcela Walerstein	...	Sara
Javier Dorado	...	Paquito
Elvira Lindo	...	Belinda
Antonio Muñoz Molina	...	Paciente
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Ángel Alcázar
David Alcazar
Jorge Alcázar
Noé Alcázar	...	Niño
Félix Álvarez	...	Roger
Mario Arias
Melanie Beleña	...	Tatiana (as Melanie Lauda)
Paca Carrasco	...	Madre Quinceañera
Silvia Casanova	...	Abuela Jazmina
Leopoldo Casares		(as Leopoldo Casares 'Polin')
Diana Cerezo	...	Quinceañera
Andrés de la Cruz
Lucía del Río	...	Enferma terminal
Federico González	...	Jubilado
Reyes Heredia
Eli Iranzo
Víctor Israel	...	Abuelo Jazmina
Margarita Lascoiti	...	Esposa Frustrada
Melanie Lauda
Juanjo Martínez
Vicente Mora	...	Paciente
Ernesto Rivera Moya	...	Juan de Dios
Pilar Ortega	...	Juani
Margarita Sanchez	...	Madre niño obeso
Violeta Sánchez	...	Susi
Antonia Sastre	...	Yolanda
Mariano Venancio

Also Known As:

Ten Days Without Love (International: English title)

Runtime:

110 min

Country:

Spain

Language:

Spanish

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

Argentina:Atp | Finland:K-7 | France:U | Spain:7

Filming Locations:

Madrid, Spain

Company:

Aurum Producciones

Movie Connections:

Follows La primera noche de mi vida (1998)

Soundtrack:

Again

Topsy-turvy machine-gunfire delivery

The story-line could have been rather more successful if it were not for the fact that not only the director was bent on getting it all in with just 100-odd minutes, but also the actors seemed to gang up with him to rattle off their say in the matter at a dizzy speed, such that the spectator is left rather breathless. If the film had been carried out at a speed rather a long way below that of light, we might well have been able to savour some scenes which would undoubtedly have improved by being blessedly more reposed in their enacting.

The fact that Sergi López could never impress me, let alone convince me, whether he were a barman, lion-tamer, monk, or anything else, but as a doctor psychiatrist not at all, is quite beside the point. The question is that the speed with which his character, and the others in this film, rattle off their dialogues, only left me saying to myself: but people do not talk like that. There was no natural intonation; the dialogues were spat out so precipitatedly that there was no way in which any kind of feeling for what was being said could be transposed onto the screen; thus there were no visual possibilities of deducing any kind of interpretation of real people who tend to say things very much in a different way. However, more misfortunate than anything else, it is precisely among some of Dr. Miguel's patients that I found some of the more interesting characterization in this film.

In the end, things were just too tiresome to take in; one could not give a damn as to what happened to Miguel or anybody else. Someone should make this film again, with better actors, a different director, and far more slowly. Then everything would make more sense. But as it is, this film left me neither entertained, nor pleased, nor worried, and I could not care less.

The only good point, I suppose, was that Lucio Godoy produced some interesting pieces in the music. But as for the rest, I interject that I want to see real people playing out their parts - not machine-gunfire deliveries at point-blank range which did absolutely nothing to enhance either the comedy category or the romance genre into which supposedly this film is classified.