These transplanted communities were improvised and garnered few in the government that really cared about their plight. In the heart of this world, we meet Manolo Vital (Eduard Fernández) a man with a pronounced sense of empathy who rallies the people around him to improve their plight in life.

From extremely humble beginnings we then catch up with Manolo twenty years later. His lot in life has improved but his local community is still ignored by the local government and lacks almost everything but the most basic services. His job as a city bus driver has allowed him a better life but he still feels for his community.

Based on the true story of Manolo Vital, this work won the Best Film category at the 39th Goya Awards in 2025. It is a slow burner and takes its time to engage the viewer but as the story progresses it draws you in and you begin to emphasise with these people. Their lives were hard and this adversity helped to build an inspiring community that was inclusive and caring.
Rob Hudson

El 47 screenings in Brisbane
PALACE BARRACKS
Wednesday 18th June 8:30pm
Friday 20th June 8:30pm
Thursday 26th June 1:15pm
Sunday 29th June 10:30am

PALACE JAMES ST
Thursday 19th June 8:30pm
Saturday 21st June 11:00am
Sunday 29th June 3:50pm
Tuesday 1st July 1.15pm

The Spanish Film Festival runs in Brisbane from 11 June – 2 July 2025, and will take place at the Palace James Street and Palace Barracks cinemas.

Click here for more information about the festival, or head to the official website for more information and to book your tickets!
www.spanishfilmfestival.com

Humberto Suárez (José Luis Gómez) is a very rich maven of the pharmaceutical industry that wants to create something to be remembered by and figures why not make a film. His complete lack of experience poses not problem. He buys the rights to a book he’s never read and hires famous director Lola Cuevas (Penélope Cruz).

Cuevas is a world class eccentric and she hires matinee idol Félix Rivero (Antonio Banderas) and world class thespian Iván Torres (Oscar Martínez) for the two lead roles. The two immediately clash and this conflict is played out in full humour mode. Rivero is a legend in his own mind and Torres the consummate professional.

Official Competition is unafraid to go dark places and its black humour points out the preposterous with a razor sharp edge. It mixes equal parts fun and condemnation for the excesses that money and fame can create in an industry with little restraints. It’s a wild ride worth taking.
Rob Hudson

Official Competition screenings in Brisbane
PALACE JAMES ST
Friday 6, May 3:45 PM
Saturday 7, May 6:00 PM
Saturday 14, May 3:50 PM

PALACE BARRACKS
Sunday 8, May 3:15 PM
Monday 9, May 1:20 PM

The Spanish Film Festival runs in Brisbane from Thursday, April 28 to Wednesday, May 18, and will take place at the Palace James Street and Palace Barracks cinemas.

Click here for more information about the festival, or head to the official website for more information and to book your tickets!
www.spanishfilmfestival.com

Adam (Mark Duplass) receives a present from his husband for 100 Spanish lessons. They are to be delivered remotely by Cariño (Natalie Morales). Adam lives the life of luxury in the United States while Cariño has to ply her trade remotely from Costa Rica. Through circumstance, they become much more than teacher and student.

Underlined by some very serious themes, the film is a joy to behold and its emotional ride, while not always easy is tremendously satisfying. It’s a great introduction to this year’s Moro Spanish Film Festival. Language Lessons is a Festival Special presentation.

Language Lessons screenings in Brisbane
PALACE BARRACKS
Friday 29, April 6:20 PM
Monday 2, May 3:50 PM
Friday 6, May 6:00 PM
Tuesday 10, May 1:30 PM
Saturday 14, May 8:20 PM

PALACE JAMES ST
Tuesday 3, May 4:10 PM
Thursday 5, May 11:15 AM
Friday 13, May 1:30 PM

The Spanish Film Festival runs in Brisbane from Thursday, April 28 to Wednesday, May 18, and will take place at the Palace James Street and Palace Barracks cinemas.

Click here for more information about the festival, or head to the official website for more information and to book your tickets!
www.spanishfilmfestival.com

It is so up-lifting and life reaffirming, it belongs on anyone’s and everyone’s list of must see films. The cast is made up of professional and non-professional actors and they both do a superlative job.

Javier Gutiérrez is Marco, a basketball coach on a downward spiral. He has separated from his wife, gotten fired from his coaching duties and then thrown in jail for drunk driving. The judge offers him community service in lieu of jail time where he has to coach a team made up of mentally disabled players.

At first he follows the self absorbed path that lead him nowhere before he starts to think of them before himself. The team members are played by all amateur actors and they will absolutely win over your heart. Also of note is the relaxed delivery of the Spanish dialogue in the film. This makes for an easy go to both watch the film and keep up with the subtitles.

Champions is screening in Brisbane:
Palace James Street
Thursday 25, April 1:45 PM
Sunday 28, April 3:00 PM
Friday 3, May 6:15 PM
Saturday 11, May 6:15 PM

Palace Barracks
Friday 26, April 6:15 PM
Tuesday 30, April 8:30 PM
Sunday 5, May 3:30 PM
Tuesday 7, May 8:50 PM
Sunday 12, May 5:50 PM

Presented by Palace, the 2019 Moro Spanish Film Festival’s national program features 32 films from Spain and Latin America, including special presentations and events, innovative documentaries, and a spotlight on female directors.

Click here more information about the program, or head to the official website for more information and to book your tickets!

Moro Spanish Film Festival
Sydney 16 Apr – 8 May: Palace Norton Street, Palace Verona & Palace Central.
Canberra 17 Apr – 8 May: Palace Electric Cinema.
Melbourne 18 Apr – 8 May: The Astor Theatre, Palace Cinema Como, Palace Brighton Bay, Palace Westgarth, The Kino and Palace Balwyn.
Adelaide 23 Apr – 15 May: Palace Nova Eastend Cinemas & Palace Nova Prospect Cinemas.
Perth 24 Apr – 15 May: Palace Cinema Paradiso.
Brisbane 24 Apr – 15 May: Palace James St and Palace Barracks Cinemas
Hobart 2 May – 8 May: State Cinema.
Byron Bay 10 – 26 May: Palace Byron Bay
www.spanishfilmfestival.com

Sofía deals with this financial crises the only way she can, by completely ignoring it. Things are crumbling around her and it’s to the quality of Salas’ performance that you see this uncertainty and the fear it instills in her in such fine detail. It’s in the cracks of her tightly wound persona that the details become apparent. This is a voyeuristic tale of the rich with a stark reality at its centre.

The Good Girls is screening in Brisbane:
Palace Barracks
Thursday 25, April 8:45 PM
Monday 6, May 6:30 PM

Palace James Street
Tuesday 30, April 6:30 PM
Tuesday 14, May 6:30 PM

Presented by Palace, the 2019 Moro Spanish Film Festival’s national program features 32 films from Spain and Latin America, including special presentations and events, innovative documentaries, and a spotlight on female directors.

Click here more information about the program, or head to the official website for more information and to book your tickets!

Moro Spanish Film Festival
Sydney 16 Apr – 8 May: Palace Norton Street, Palace Verona & Palace Central.
Canberra 17 Apr – 8 May: Palace Electric Cinema.
Melbourne 18 Apr – 8 May: The Astor Theatre, Palace Cinema Como, Palace Brighton Bay, Palace Westgarth, The Kino and Palace Balwyn.
Adelaide 23 Apr – 15 May: Palace Nova Eastend Cinemas & Palace Nova Prospect Cinemas.
Perth 24 Apr – 15 May: Palace Cinema Paradiso.
Brisbane 24 Apr – 15 May: Palace James St and Palace Barracks Cinemas
Hobart 2 May – 8 May: State Cinema.
Byron Bay 10 – 26 May: Palace Byron Bay
www.spanishfilmfestival.com

The twenty-day festival, which showcases 25 films, will close with Guillermo del Toro’s masterpiece PAN’S LABYRINTH. The visionary Mexican director recently took home four Academy Awards including Best Film and Best Director with a further nine nominations for his whimsical and spellbinding underwater romance The Shape of Water. To celebrate this incredible achievement, we’re bringing his beloved dark fairy-tale back to the big screen to close the 21st Festival.

Special event screenings of the film that has skyrocketed to the top of the 2018 Spanish box-office – NO FILTER (Sin rodeos) – will take place nationally with drinks and music before the film. In NO FLITER, one of Spain’s most popular comedic talents, Santiago Segura, directs Maribel Verdú as a woman who takes a remedy that makes her unable to stop speaking her mind.

The REEL ESPAÑOL spotlight celebrates all the best new Spanish cinema. With hit dramas including: LOVING PABLO – starring Penélope Cruz as a journalist who strikes up a romantic relationship with notorious drug lord Pablo Escobar (Javier Bardem); Audience Award winning THE OPEN DOOR, which stars Carmen Machi as a prostitute past her prime living with her senile but feisty mother; a standout cast of Spain’s finest actors star in historical epic GOLD; and DYING (Morir) from breakout director Fernando Franco – a follow-up to his
Spanish Academy Award winning debut Wounded.

The section also celebrates all the fun and cheekiness of Spanish culture with laugh-out-loud comedies: LORD, GIVE ME PATIENCE (Señor, dame paciencia) about an ultraconservative father who has to spend a weekend with his dysfunctional adult children and their partners; from maverick director Pablo Berger comes madcap comedy ABRACADABRA; three overprotective fathers conspire to scare off their daughters’ no-good boyfriends in IT’S FOR YOUR OWN GOOD (Es por tu bien); and in the heist comedy OPERATION GOLDENSHELL (Operación concha), a con artist hires a lookalike to pose as a movie star to scam an investor.

Other festival favourites in this program strand include: MIST & THE MAIDEN (La niebla y la doncella), adapted from Lorenzo Silva’s best-selling novel and featuring a roll-call of Spanish favourites; Spanish Academy Award nominee Marc Clotet (The Sleeping Voice 2011) and Melina Matthews (The Returned 2013) star in period drama THE CHESS PLAYER (El jugador de ajedrez), Luis Oliveros’s second feature; the latest work from filmmaking duo Bacha Caravedo and Chinón Higashionna THE SOLAR SYSTEM (El sistema solar); and RE-EVOLUTION, an action-thriller which packs in an all-star cast including Fele Martínez, Hovik Keuchkerian and Juan Pablo Shuk.

The REEL DIRECTORAS sidebar showcases the innovative work being produced by the next generation of Spain’s female directors. The programme includes four feature debuts, most notably Carla Simón’s internationally award-winning SUMMER 1993 – which enjoys encore screenings by popular demand, having amassed 28 award wins and 44 nominations across the globe, including Best New Director at the Spanish Academy Awards, the Best First Feature at the London Film Festival and Best Film at the Mumbai Film Festival since its 2017 premiere. The stellar line-up also includes Ana Murugarren’s THE BASTARDS’ FIG TREE,
Marina Seresesky’s THE OPEN DOOR, and Elena Martín’s JÚLIA IS.

In REEL RETROSPECTIVE: THE BIGAS LUNA TRIBUTE a four-film programme will celebrate the work of internationally renowned Spanish director Bigas Luna who simultaneously launched the careers of Javier Bardem, Jordi Mollà and Penelope Cruz. This retrospective includes his critically-acclaimed ‘Iberian Portraits Trilogy’: JAMÓN, JAMÓN (1992), GOLDEN BALLS (1993) and THE TIT AND THE MOON (1994); as well as the Australian premiere of the posthumous documentary BIGAS X BIGAS (2017), based on his video-diaries. The trilogy offers a complex depiction of a Spain in transition, where older customs and stereotypes associated with the rural, simpler past survive alongside newly introduced European/global, capitalist values. Screenings will be followed by a panel discussion with Professor Santiago Fouz Hernández (Durham University) and Professor Alfredo Martínez Expósito (The University of Melbourne). Drinks and tapas will be served with
Spanish guitar music for the events in Melbourne (22 April), Brisbane (29 April) and Sydney (1 May). This event is sponsored by the Spanish Embassy in Australia (Spanish Cooperation), Durham University and The University of Melbourne.

The REEL INFANTIL section for kid-friendly films includes two stand-out features. The first is TAD THE LOST EXPLORER AND THE SECRET OF KING MIDAS – the sequel to the highest-grossing animated film in Spain of all time. This time amateur explorer Tad Jones must stop a millionaire who’s after King Midas’s necklace. The other family film is Disney Pixar’s Academy Award winning COCO. Full of wit, music, and colour, this beloved animation follows a young boy who dreams of being a musician despite his family’s generations old ban on music.

Spanish Film Festival 2018
NSW 17 April – 6 May Palace Verona, Palace Norton Street, Palace Central Sydney
ACT 18 April – 6 May Palace Electric
VIC 19 April – 6 May Palace Cinema Como, Kino Cinemas, Palace Brighton Bay, The Astor Theatre & Palace Westgarth
WA 26 April – 16 May Cinema Paradiso
QLD 26 April – 13 May Palace Barracks & Palace Centro James St
SA 26 April – 13 May Palace Nova Eastend & Palace Nova Prospect Cinemas
TAS 3 May – 9 May State Cinema
www.spanishfilmfestival.com