“There are really only two things that can turn a bad day into a great one: The first is love. But to be honest, that’s not for today. My third wife just dumped me. The second is a heist worth millions of euros,” future Spanish Mint robber Berlin, played again by Pedro Alonso, says at …
In this fervent adaptation of Federico García Lorca s 1933 play
Blood Wedding, Spanish director Paula Ortiz has shifted the focus of her source material from men battling to possess a woman to, as the title indicates, the bride (Inma Cuesta) herself.
The Bride is soaked in Lorca s fatalistic romanticism, but now its doomed love triangle is seen through the woman s conflicting needs: the safety offered by a wealthy, besotted groom (Asier Etxeandía) versus the reciprocal passion she feels with first love Leonardo (Álex García), who married her cousin (Leticia Dolera).
Ortiz and co-screenwriter Javier García Arredondo emphasize the earthiness of Lorca s poetry, and Goya-winning cinematographer Miguel Amoedo uses the stunning landscape to dwarf and define the characters. (The surreal fairy chimney rock formations are a World Heritage site in Turkey s Cappadocia region.) Conflict between Lorca s rural Andalusian families is now rooted in a backstory of blood fe