El gran salto adelante

The story of German born brother and sister Lidia and Ernst Hahn, whose lives spanned many of the major upheavals of the 20th century: from the Soviet Revolution and the Spanish Civil War to the Second World War and Pinochet’s coup d’état. All of which is recounted in the oral testimony of Jacinto Vaello Hahn, who was their son and nephew, respectively.

After Franco's death in 1975, Spanish society experienced a period of hope and political struggle, as well as a remarkable change in social customs. Santamarca High School, in Madrid, faithfully embodied that time: it was at the forefront of student and anti-fascist struggles, hosted an intense cultural activity, and generated relationships between teachers and students that were unusual for today's times. Years later it also suffered the general evolution of the country, from militancy to hedonism.

Munich, birch forests, a secret. Above all, a movie dream.

Rosa starts to go out with her neighbour at the boarding house, a Turkish soldier and a writer called Iskander. Some months later, the two get married and move out to live together in Iskander’s hometown on the Mediterranean coast. In this place, Rosa begins to learn many things about life, but her suspicions are also aroused.

Five girls and boys periodically publish a cultural magazine, a kind of guide to the city's leisure activities. Each one is in charge of an area, from literature to cinema. And they live varied stories, both among themselves and with other people outside the group.

Rosa’s calm existence is disrupted by the arrival of the charming adventurer Ivan. Blinded by unconditional and self-destructive love for him, she leaves everything behind to follow him to the end.

A Taylor comes to town looking for top-quality leather. From his apartment window, he watches the comings and goings of the other inhabitants. He grows obsessed with a woman who is also desired by the rich, powerful owner of the building. The rivalry between the two men leads to a series of events culminating in a dramatic ending.

A sequel to País de todo a 100 (Country of Everything at 100).

A musician famous in the 80s thanks to a song, the personification of so many Spanish pop musicians; his best friend, an apparently famous painter, and the crossovers between two worlds where differentiating between truth and illusion doesn’t matter: that is the storyline of 'The Journey to Kyoto'. What begins as a tragicomedy about a musician clinging to a distant past where he tasted glory, ends up being a precise metaphor for our day, where we all have the same pretensions of living an old success.

Toño works as a local policeman in his town. He is clumsy and his neighbors laugh at him, so he asks his old teacher at the academy for help. What he finds is a town full of tensions, with a day laborers' strike that doesn't help.

3 settings evoked in a stylised manner: a city with a harbour; a man killing young women and his rituals. The Legend of the Bridge of the Sighs at Venice; the parties and the rituals. A sailor viewing sights from his boat.

Take that tacky look of 60's TV programmes, add some dashes of colour and humour to the pervading aseptic white, mix in some footage that would be happy in a horror film, wait... and you'll have a homemade dish that, though its made using absolutely genuine recipes, leaves a very special taste in the mouth.

Arturo is a music enthusiast, although his skills as a guitarist are lesser. Urgently incorporated into a band, he is soon fired, although he will remain linked to it as a manager... or so he thinks. As the band grows in popularity, his link with it will diminish.

The owner of a pastry shop in decline celebrates winning a prize in the pools in a brothel and dies. With the money, his widow and three daughters relaunch the business and turn it into one of the centers of social life in the neighborhood (with excellent pastries).

The flash of socialism that once lit Spain.

Two friends come to Spain to do a trip around the country. One is Spanish; he left Madrid five years ago, at the beginning of the crisis, in order to live in Berlin. The other is a Finnish, and he was in the country only once, when he was eight years ago. During some weeks around Christmas 2013, they take a ride, taking notes of the things they see and the big changes happened in all these past years: economic crisis, huge unemployment, the battle for social services, the unfinished residential states scattered for the whole country, many changes in how people live, the generational gap, etc.