Queens (Reinas) 7:00 pm • FrI, sept 29 • the Guild cinema

Queens is a fantastic, lively and comedic look at the nature of relationships from Spanish director Manuel Gomez Pereira. With same-sex marriage legalized in Spain, three couples from different social strata plan to attend a mass ceremony and become husbands. But like all weddings, nothing ever goes as smoothly as planned. Oscar and Miguel have enough on their plate when Oscar’s mother arrives from Argentina and declares her intention of staying with the couple indefinitely. The arrangement could be tolerated if not for her Miguel-hating sheepdog, which brings out some repressed tension between the couple. Rafa and Jonas are stuck with the task of making Rafa’s famous actress mother civil to Jonas’s father, her gardener. And Hugo and Narciso face some rather surprising infidelity on the eve of the ceremony.

Pereira takes great care to remove all stereotypes when dealing with his couples and instead makes the real ‘queens’ of this film the mothers. Fans of the work of Pedro Almodovar will recognize most of the mothers as present-day stars of the spanish screen. Marisa Paredes, of All About My Mother, plays Rafa’s famous mother with a wink towards her own fame. Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown’s Carmen Maura is a headstrong hotel owner hosting the ceremony, in which her son will be partaking. And Verónica Forqué (Kika) is an over-the-top nymphomaniac whose desires, as well as her addiction to her therapist, nearly destroy her son’s impending nuptials. In the end, it is up to the mothers to jump in and save the day when a hotel strike nearly halts the ceremony. Pereira does not use his film as platform from which to preach about the rights of any and all couples to marry. Rather, he uses heart, wit and a bit of slapstick to show that, among the unexpected twists and turns of life, one can always rely on his mother to show him who he really is. – Jeremy Olsen (Spain, 2005, 107 min. dir: Manuel Gomez Pereira. Spanish with English subtitles)

plays with: Guess Who I Saw Today?

The unfaithful husband story gets a new twist in this musical gem from director Abe Sylvia. (USA, 2006, 4 mins, dir: Abe Sylvia)