Cha Cha Cha

A light comedy about partying twenty-something Spaniards in the '80 s, CHA CHA CHA provides pleasant entertainment and provokes nostalgic comparisons with the darker, heavier '90 s Madrid party flicks so immersed in stark social themes. Perhaps its most appealing feature to European film buffs is the casting of today's biggest box-office draws dishing out what most people expect from the film: beautiful people enjoying the idealized mid-1980 s yuppie lifestyle. It is refreshing in its accurate somewhat romanticized evocation of the recent past.

An inconsequential comedy with the right packaging and sympathy enough , dealing with Lucia (Ana Alvarez) , she is an ad-agency career girl and dance teacher Maria (María Adánez) , they are two good friends who share everything. Everything except Pablo, Maria's boyfriend. One night Lucia puts away too much alcohol and makes love with sexist Pablo, then she falls in love for him . Then Lucia devising all kinds of tricks to make Pablo (Jorge Sanz) her own , while getting María a new fiance. Lucía tries by any means to get him and that's why she chooses unemployed actor Antonio (Eduardo Noriega) , a handsome guy but not too bright, so that he fulfills the mission for which he is paid.

This is a brilliant comedy with usual ingredients, such as amusing messes, friends relationship , loving betrayals , and youthful social customs ; maintaining a comfortable and harmless comic tone throughout the film that is neither passionate nor irritating, but amusing . However, made on a low budget , appearing limited settings, in fact it feels somewhat claustrophobic due to the fact that it is mostly set on the flats , restaurants and restrooms. It results to be a simple , plain and agreeable comedy about young friends , creating all kinds of hectic situations , adding twisted romances with things going wrong . The references that can be traced are very heterogeneous. Cha-cha-chá ranges from a reverse and supposedly feminist revision of the myth of Pygmalion, here Lucia is forced to do a "My Fair Lady" upgrade on the raw material by educating the bad-manners Antonio during several Pygmalion-styled sessions and adding other inspirations which include the winks of rigor as the classical screwball comedies from Howard Hawks , Ernest Lubitsch or George Cukor. Stars a likeable group of young actors to be followed successful careers , such as : Eduardo Noriega, Ana Álvarez, María Adánez and Jorge Sanz . Interesting to see how Noriega performs with ease in the field of comedy, a genre in which he rarely ventures. His performance is more than convincing if he compares it to what he did in Thesis , Nadie conoce a nadie or Abre los ojos. The staff of interpreters that accompanies him is at his level. They're wel assisted by an enjoyabl support cast giving decent interpretations such as Marta Belaustegui , Elisa Matilla , including funny appearances of the caricatural role played by Gabino Diego and ordinary cameo by filmmaker Antonio del Real himself as a Director Spot.

The motion picture was adequately written by prestigious Fernando León de Aranoa and professionally directed by accustomed comedy director Antonio del Real. Actor/writer/director Antonio del Real is good filmmaker expert on comedies as he has proved in ¨Crazy heart¨, ¨Por Fin Solos¨, ¨Cafe coca y Puro¨ ,¨Woman of your life¨ , ¨Men always lie¨, ¨ Powerful Influjo of moon¨ , ¨Tell you something stupid... for example, I love you¨ ¨Buscando Perico¨, ¨Por fin solos¨, and this his greatest success : ¨Cha ,Cha, Cha¨ . In addition , he also directed some dramas as ¨El Rio Que Nos Lleva¨ and a big budgeted film ¨Conjura Del Escorial¨ based on historic deeds about intrigue and fight-power in court of Philip II and played by an international cast as Julia Ormond and Jason Isaacs , adding , of course, his daughter Blanca Jara , who often plays his movies . His last film is a thriller titlled El Clavo de Oro . Rating : 6/10 . Acceptable and passable film for Spanish comedy enthusiasts .

So many things were taboo when Franco ruled: but here we are with an imitation of the sopless silliness of the Franco years, but just simply adding in the sexy bits and other previously frowned-on ingredients. Using actors who should have stayed where they were, doing rubbishy TV series on the different national and regional channels, here is a cooked up waste of time and effort by all concerned: there's nothing new. There was no message. Just paltry little situations which were neither funny nor led to anywhere or anything else. Contrived, the same as the too well-known faces who are mostly capable of only filling up 30 minute weightless TV series with ham interpretations. Just nothing going for it - not even the abused selection of pieces of Tchaickovsky did anything to add a little dignity to the trash. No, if you want to see where decent Spanish cinema is going, forget this stupidity with an intellectual level of around zero (the same as my vote), and I'll recommend other worthwhile titles elsewhere on IMDb for more serious cinema-lovers.

Antonio, a model, is a good looking man who under the right management can go places. When Lucia, who works for an advertising agency falls for her best friend's fiancé, Pablo. She decides to hire Antonio to pretend he is in love with Maria, Pablo's girlfriend, an intelligent woman who is highly cultured and has a lot of common sense to believe in all what Antonio tells her. Lucia wants to separate them at all costs; she schemes to have Pablo all to herself. Lucia doesn't know she will be making a fatal mistake: she is falling for the handsome Antonio herself.

This silly, but moderate entertaining comedy, will not win any awards, yet, it produces a few laughs with its quick dialog and funny situations. Antonio del Real, the director, captures these people in their schemings and machinations well. Best of all is the cast, which, in the case of Eduardo Noriega, has done better in other things. As Antonio, Mr. Noriega is the best thing in the movie. Ana Alvarez, who plays the scheming Lucia, has some good moments in the film, as well. Maria Adamez, is seen as Maria. Jorge Sanz, appears as Pablo.

The film is moderately entertaining, but don't expect too much, just sit back and relax watching these people in action.

"Cha-Cha-Cha", a slick Spanish entry in the light romantic comedy genre proves that Hollywood has not cornered the market on inconsequential fluff. There are not many surprises here...it falls short of screw-ball comedy and lacks the bathos and quirkiness of Almadovar. However, a patient viewer will be rewarded with more than a glimpse of the marvelous Mr. Noriega who seems born for the camera and should have a long, distinguished career ahead of him in international films and the reborn post-Franco Spanish film industry. The closer the camera gets to him, the more astounding he is. Let's hope that some of his better performances will get across the Atlantic, although his last major film "Alatriste", a big budget opus starring Viggo Mortenson no less, has still not done so more than a year after its Spanish release.