Second film session of the Luis García Berlanga retrospective, with the screening of That Happy Couple (1951), a feature co-directed by Luis García Berlanga and Juan Antonio Bardem.

9 MAR | SUN | 5PM

ESA PAREJA FELIZ | THAT HAPPY COUPLE

Luis García Berlanga and Juan Antonio Bardem | ESP | 1951 | 78’

One of the films that participated in the renewal of Spanish cinema after the civil war, Esa Pareja Feliz also brings together two of the directors who most actively contributed to the modernization of this cinematography. Luis García Berlanga co-scripted and directed the film with Juan Antonio Bardem, both of whom came out of the Instituto de Investigaciones y Experiencias Cinematográficas (which would later become the Escuela Oficial de Cine de España). The film depicts the story of a young couple from humble beginnings who struggle with money, work and housing problems, combining, in complete complicity, the comic tone that Berlanga imprints through the influence of American comedies, and the social denunciation that would characterize Bardem's vision, while also showing a strong neorealist influence.