Official Competition

I enjoy that Official Competition really sends up that kind of brooding artist persona.

This movie-making industry satire is witty, intelligent and saved from potentially unbearable navel-gazing by the warmth, talent and sheer charismatic chemistry of Cruz and Banderas.

Gaston Duprat and Mariano Cohn’s Official Competition may be yet another satire on filmmaking, but it’s the rare iteration that’s nuanced enough to understand that self-awareness does not equal absolution.

It dismantles the lofty ambitions of cinema as great, important and significant, a monument on the cultural landscape. Instead, it shows us art for ego’s sake, and it has a lot of wickedly spiteful fun doing so.

[Cruz] has rarely been stronger on screen, as an idiosyncratic martinet who nonetheless finds moments of genius and tenderness between her leading men. A blast.

An uproarious comedy that’s also deliciously well-performed... this Spanish-language gem cleverly gets away with being both roast session and sneaky celebration at once.

Despite pranks like the boulder, the humour is in the script and sidelong glances. It’s all the funnier and cleverer for it, lampooning not just the film industry but all creative aspiration and the vanity that can accompany its success.

I’m not kidding when I say that I needed to take a break halfway through my viewing because of how relentlessly bored I was getting.

Its protagonists will oscillate from ridicule to sanctification or appreciation. Consequently, the general tone of the narrative is one of an acidic and sarcastic comedy that dramatically laughs at artistic clichés and the film industry itself...

Tightly constructed, and its sharp, witty script elevates the already fascinating and dedicated performances. Official Competition is a fiery satire and one of the funniest films I have seen this year so far.