Director
Gracia Querejeta
(SIETE MESAS DE BILLAR FRANCÉS, HÉCTOR)

Stars
Maribel Verdú, Paula Echevarría, Asier Rikarte, Miguel Bernardeau, Antonio Resines, Raúl Peña, Juana Acosta, Raúl Arévalo, Luis Tosar, Montse Pla, Nora Navas and Javier Cámara

For the second consecutive year, the film I am reviewing for the Moro Spanish Film Festival (accompanied by the Cine Latino Film Festival this year) is a dark comedy whose premise unlocks the door for an overflow of outrageous humour to come. Though it may not become as ridiculous and macabre as last year’s film festival release ABRACADABRA, CRIME WAVE is further indication Spanish comedies really are an acquired taste that have barely tickled my taste buds to date.

Maribel Verdú (from ABRACADABRA) stars as Leyre, a divorced single mother who goes to desperate lengths to cover for her son, Asier (played by Asier Rikarte) after he kills her ex-husband and his father, Cosme (Luis Tosar). A conundrum whose secrecy only increases in difficulty to maintain when Cosme’s current wife, Vanesa (Paula Echevarría) and her lawyer, Susana (Juana Acosta) become suspicious of his disappearance. Soon enough and one way or another, several others become embroiled in the crime, including Asier’s best friend, Julen (Miguel Bernardeau), a taxi driver and wannabe actor (played by Raúl Arévalo), Leyre’s mother and her carer (Montse Pla and Nora Navas, respectively), two policemen (Antonio Resines and Raúl Peña) and a nonchalant Priest (Javier Cámara), whom Leyre confesses to as the film begins.

To put it straightforwardly, CRIME WAVE is not particularly a good film. Even after placing my own feelings towards it aside. At best, it is capable of moderately entertaining and its conclusion is less foreseeable courtesy of the individual involvements from so many supporting characters. But far too often throughout, the execution in comic timing and even in general filmmaking is noticeably quite poor and certainly not at a cinematic standard. As a result, a greater dependency is placed onto the script and the film’s brand of comedy to source enjoyment from. Unfortunately, the blacker areas of humour never really blend seamlessly with the rest of the picture. Furthermore, the plot developments become too farcical and contrived for me to appreciate and for a movie that has so many characters in it, such minor contributions have been derived from them. For instance, Leyre’s mother makes an impressionable first appearance, but is then virtually made redundant by having the same stale lines recycled over and over again. This missed opportunity to give these characters plenty more perk, which in turn would have surely sharpened this film’s premise and its unflattering conclusion, is where CRIME WAVE could have been a festival highlight rather than a festival blight.

2 stars

Viewer Discretion
TBA

Trailer
CRIME WAVE

Moviedoc thanks Asha Holmes Publicity, the Moro Spanish Film Festival and Palace Cinemas for the invite to the screening of this film.

Review by Leigh for Moviedoc
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