Mario Balarezo del Caz

“Buried” helmer Rodrigo Cortés has already dove into his latest project which should intrigue international audiences once again. Principal photography began in Barcelona on “Red Lights”, Cortés third feature film, with a cast that includes Sigourney Weaver, Robert DeNiro, Cillian Murphy, recently favorite Sundance sensation Elizabeth Olsen (“Martha Marcy May Marlene” and “Silent House”) with such names as Toby Jones, Joely Richardson and Leonardo Sbaraglia giving life to supporting characters.

2010 was the weakest year at the Spanish box office in a decade – proof that the films with the most box office potential fell flat. Actually, very few have performed decently. Ironically the biggest flops and the most coldly received by critics films are the ones top lining the nominations for this year's Spanish Academy Awards, the Goyas.

2010 gave us a unique batch of films in Emilio Aragon's Paper Birds, Achero Manas's Anything You Want, Jordi Cadena & Judith Colell's Elisa K. and festival circuit favorites in Javier Mariscal & Fernando Trueba's Chico y Rita, Guillem Morales' Julia’s Eyes, Iciar Bollain's Even the Rain, Andrucha Washington' Lope and Alex de la Iglesia's nutty concoction The Last Circus (Balada triste de trompeta), but 2011 will be one hell of a ride.

While Alejandro González Iñárritu's drama's only saving grace might be Javier Bardem´s acting, the rest of the film suffers from a jaded structure that seems only the skilled hands of Guillermo Arriaga could have made effective and the same goes for Álex de la Iglesia's film where majestic sequences are overtly ridiculous at times, I saw it as a bad mismatch blending of the genres.

O Apóstolo isn't only the latest animated offering from Spain, but it reflects upon Spain's rich history in film animation. For some, the more recent “Planet 51” was considered a major landmark due to the budget size, overseas box office, and the huge technical advances it made in rapport to previous films in the genre, but the latest animated offering, which was set to have its world premiere at Sitges International Fantastic Film Festival but has since shifted plans, is a bigger, more detailed, stereoscopic 3D item that is poised to become a benchmark in the animation field.