There’s a certain kind of film about film-making that fully buys into the magic and mystery; that devours the dream factory narrative and delivers a warm embrace of a movie, channelling a message about the transformative power of cinema. Michel Hazanavicius’s The Artist is one example; so, in its lo-fi way, is Son of Rambow. And Singin’ in the Rain, for all the sprinkling of behind-the-camera cynicism, is a classic of the kind. Official Competition is none of these. Rather than a love letter to the cinematic arts, this very funny Spanish-language satire, starring Penélope Cruz and Antonio Banderas, is more of a poison pen jab to the jugular. It dismantles the lofty ambitions of cinema as great, important and significant, a monument on the cultural landscape. Instead, it shows us art for ego’s sake, and it has a lot of wickedly spiteful fun doing so.
The film opens with a slow-panning shot across the 80th birthday present haul of pharmaceuticals billionaire Don Humberto (José Luis Gómez). A lifesize ceramic collie, a painting of a sad clown, a gun, a massage chair: Humberto surveys it all with displeasure, his waxily well-preserved face creasing into a frown. “How do they see me?” he demands of the craven assistant dancing attendance a cautiously respectful distance away (the extravagant shifts in focus between the two during this exchange emphasise just how far removed Humberto is from the rest of the world). The billionaire decides that he needs to reframe his legacy. And how better to launder a tainted reputation than by bankrolling a piece of great cinema?
