It has been a rather depressing week for Valencia. It began with a loss in their Champions League game, it continued when their new stadium plans were abruptly put on hold due to financial problems and finally, a sorry defeat to Mallorca at the weekend leaves Los Che with just a single victory in six competitive games. At Mallorca’s Iberostar stadium Victor Casadesús fired the hosts into the lead just seven minutes into the game when he squeezed his shot under Diego Alves. The visitors enjoyed more of the ball for the remainder of the first half and were unlucky not to level the score when Nelson Valdez's header came crashing back off the bar. Despite the continual pressure from … [Read more...] about La Liga: Mallorca defeat completes sorry week for Valencia
Spain News
San Sebastián Film Festival: Snow White hits Andalusia
Not long after movie audiences made the pleasing discovery, thanks to last year's The Artist, that silent films can still be enjoyable, Pablo Berger's Blancanieves, competing in this year's Official Section, provides yet another silent revelation. The story of Snow White set in early 20th century Andalusia actually works. Berger's Blancanieves is Carmencita (played by Sofía Oria and Macarena García), born in Seville during the Belle Époque, a rose-tinted era of Spain's past that lends itself perfectly to silent cinema. Snow White's father is a handsome and celebrated bullfighter, her mother a famous flamenco dancer who dies in childbirth after seeing her husband gored and left paralysed … [Read more...] about San Sebastián Film Festival: Snow White hits Andalusia
San Sebastián Film Festival: Gere finds sinister charm in ‘Arbitrage’
The San Sebastian Film Festival got off to a cracking start on Friday with US film Arbitrage, starring Richard Gere, Susan Sarandon and Tim Roth and directed by Nicholas Jarecki. Opening the event’s 60th edition, Jarecki's film is competing in this year's Official Section. Arbitrage is a tense thriller, set against a corporate backdrop, with a tight script and an energetic pace that is largely down to script writer and debutant director Jarecki. Gere plays Robert Miller, a business magnate who is ready to sell up, supposedly to spend more time with his family. At first he looks as if he has it all: a loving wife (an excellent if little-seen Sarandon), a devoted son and a brilliant … [Read more...] about San Sebastián Film Festival: Gere finds sinister charm in ‘Arbitrage’
The Pep Paradox
August 2016: The newly-proclaimed state of Catalonia has separated completely from Spain, whose flags no longer fly anywhere in the city of Barcelona except on the flagstaff of the Spanish Embassy. The sports press is full of news about the recent “friendly” international between the Catalan and Spanish national teams, the first in history, which despite a few ugly incidents outside the stadium passed off without a hitch. A goalless draw was seen by many as a fitting result to symbolise the relations between Spain and the nascent Catalan Republic. And of course the main story for sportswriters, as always, is FC Barcelona – Barça – as they prepare for a new season… playing against Real … [Read more...] about The Pep Paradox
Santiago Carrillo: the nearly man
Santiago Carrillo, who has died at the age of 97, belonged to another time, or perhaps more accurately, and depending on one’s age, to a number of other times: the Civil War; the decades of exile during the Franco regime; the first years after the death of the dictator; but above all to a time when people still took Communism seriously. Despite his failure to secure a lasting place for the Spanish Communist Party (PCE) in Spanish political life, he managed to reinvent himself as one of the guardians of that most revered institution, the transition to democracy. While still in his teens, as a member of the Socialist Youth, Carrillo took part in the uprising in Asturias in 1934, and was … [Read more...] about Santiago Carrillo: the nearly man
La Liga: Atletico survive scare and Real lose again
A guard of honour may not be a tradition normally associated with Atlético Madrid but playing their first league game since they demolished Chelsea 4-1 in the UEFA Super Cup just over a fortnight ago, that was exactly what they got. Winning silverware is not such a novelty in the other half of Madrid these days as back in May, when the talk was of what a great season Athletic Bilbao were having and Atléti surprised everyone by beating the Basques 3-0 in the Europa League final. In Monaco, they brushed aside the reigning European Champions Chelsea with ease and despite the fact that their prize money is being withheld by UEFA for failure to comply with financial fairplay rules (the … [Read more...] about La Liga: Atletico survive scare and Real lose again
José Luis Garci’s Sherlock Holmes is out to rescue Spain
It’s now 30 years since José Luis Garci won Spain its first Oscar for Begin the Beguine. In the interim, he has made another 14 films, the latest of which, now on general release, is Holmes & Watson. Madrid Days. That 1982 Oscar gave a much-need boost to the Spanish film industry — even though the film had been panned by the critics and was a commercial flop — and, along with hosting the World Cup and Felipe González’s election win the same year, ushered in a lengthy period of national self-confidence now in tatters after the implosion of the economy. For Garci himself, winning an Academy Award must have been especially gratifying: this is a man for whom Hollywood, and particularly … [Read more...] about José Luis Garci’s Sherlock Holmes is out to rescue Spain
Disability and Spain’s low-key Paralympics
On September 9, London bid a fond farewell to this year's Paralympic Games. A fact which, if you live in Spain, may well have escaped your notice. As fireworks exploded over the Olympic Stadium in Stratford, the closing ceremony of this major international sporting event was not covered by any of Spain's major TV stations. In a departure from previous years the 2012 Games did, however, receive comprehensive coverage on Teledeportes (although Spain's national sports channel, aimed at broadcasting news across the country, changed frequency in June 2011, and I doubt ours is the only household which still does not receive it.) A quick search for Paralympic news in the national and local … [Read more...] about Disability and Spain’s low-key Paralympics
Clemency for ETA?
As early Basque elections loom, there is one issue that rages on despite efforts by the central government to let it lie: that of the controversial release of convicted ETA killer and kidnapper Iosu Uribetxebarria Bolinaga. On September 5, the Public Prosecutor's Office exercised its right to appeal against a ruling in favour of his conditional release. With a regional election scheduled for October 21, it is no surprise that even those in the Basque Partido Popular (PP) have been keen to nip the Uribetxebarria issue in the bud. Even Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy hoped to silence those in his party – most prominently Basque MEP Jaime Mayor Oreja and Madrid premier Esperanza Aguirre – who … [Read more...] about Clemency for ETA?
Schrödinger’s Catalonia
“The rushing Pequod, freighted with savages, laden with fire, […] seemed the material counterpart of her monomaniac commander's soul.” (Herman Melville, 'Moby Dick', 1851) ”We want the great majority of the people of Catalonia to embark with us on this voyage to Ithaca.” (Artur Mas, March 24, 2012) What does Catalan premier Artur Mas really want? Is it a fiscal pact with Madrid that leaves this region in control of its own taxation system? Or is it independence, the threat of which he is using to try to wrestle the fiscal pact from the central government? It is as if his real intentions were inside a closed box. The uncertainty he fosters allows for all kinds of … [Read more...] about Schrödinger’s Catalonia