• The third and final film in Berlanga’s National Trilogy (The National Shotgun, National Heritage)
  • Like almost all of Berlanga’s work, it is a political satire- I see some Altman but probably more Armando Iannucci. “No one in our family has ever worked and it was worked out great” in a long take that goes from the 5-minute to the 9-minute mark
  • Berlanga does not like to cut, the camera will sit in a medium shot for 3-4 minutes at a time, some characters will usher others back and forth, rapid-firing dialogue (again, not as witty as it was in the 1960’s). This is the director of Placido (1961) though plainly. Placido had a longer camera distance- and Berlanga would’ve been better suited throughout his career to do this, more extras, longer camera distance.
  • Never a shot/reverse shot—almost always the actors are in a three quarters profile shot
  • At the 17-minute mark there are six actors in an 8 by 8 room, all of them talking
  • The comic ineptitude of the bourgeoisie (Bunuel- but without the anger or acidity) “how will I manage without a servant?”- with six characters in a sort of dance as they walk around talking at the 28-minute mark in the room with the hams
  • The 2am scene from 39-minutes to 45-minutes, again the actors are like ushering each other in and out, Berlanga doesn’t zoom to eavesdrop like Altman, or lyrically track like Renoir, it is more about the actors blocking
  • Political coup jokes next to pornography jokes – the topless shoeshine idea made me laugh
  • At the 73-76 minute mark there is a great sequence at the train station going on the escalator with the camera and asking the priest to make change
  • José Luis López Vázquez is great as a high-maintenance, constantly complaining scoundrel
  • It is a fringe recommendation