Variety
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By
Leo Barraclough, Patrick Frater, Jamie Lang, Elsa Keslassy, Alex Ritman, Ellise Shafer, Nick Vivarelli, Naman Ramachandran, John Hopewell
“Saturn Return,” the latest film from “One Year, One Night” director Isaki Lacuesta which swept best Spanish film and director at March’s Malaga Festival, has been selected to represent Spain at the 2025 Oscars international feature race.
Sold by Latido Films, it beat out “The Blue Star” and “Marco,” the other two films on Spain’s Oscar shortlist.
At once a radical movie – seemingly, a biopic but constantly and comically subverting audience expectations with characters who can’t remember what really happened given they were drunk or drugged, or both, at the time – “Saturn Return” notwithstanding ends up as a feelgood movie of artistic triumph against adversity.
“Saturn Return” is inspired by legendary Spanish indie rock band Los Planetas, making in the late 1990s the record that sealed their reputation, despite band splits and band members’ frequently catatonic state.
Lacuesta co-directed with Pol Rodríguez and co-wrote with top Spanish screenwriter Fernando Navarro (“Below Zero”). A string of prominent companies on Spain’s indie scene produced the film: Ikiru Films, La Terraza Films, Áralan Films, Bteam Prods, Sideral Cinema, Los Ilusos Films. Bteam Pictures distributed the film in Spain.
