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Two Much is not enough -- we want to see more! That's what Spain's most prolific producer Andrés Vicente Gómez hopes to hear from U.S. audiences as they flock to see Antonio Banderas, Melanie Griffith and Darryl Hannah in Two Much, a sexy romantic comedy about two sisters who thought they had nothing in common until they realized they were sharing the same man. The film was directed and co-written by Fernando Trueba, winner of the 1993 Oscar for best foreign language film, Belle Epoque, and is a co-production of Canal Plus España and Interscope. The romp was shot in English and is the most expensive Spanish film to date, with a $14 million budget. Spanish crowds ate it up in historic numbers as more than 1.2 million people saw the film in its first three weeks of release to the tune of $5.5 million at the box office. Though the film opens in the United States two weeks after the AFM closes, its pre-ordained success has sent dozens of Spanish producers scrambling to set up English-language co-productions in hopes to tap into some of the market that Vicente Gómez knows so well.
In December 1995, Screen International ranked Vicente Gómez the 78th most powerful film player in the world on its Power 100 list, stating that he "remains unchallenged as Spain's supreme producer, with better connections to talent and a higher international profile than anyone else in the country." Vicente Gómez visited the AFM for a few hectic days in order to monitor sales of a number of projects by Sogepaq International's head of sales, Kevin Williams, and to meet with a number of buyers and producers all interested in riding the Vicente Gómez wave. Williams appears cool under pressure, juggling double-booked meetings with aplomb. Marketing assistant Giles Bones is also an integral part of the company's AFM office. Bones' British accent immediately, though subconsciously, reminds all visitors that this is no isolationist Spanish distribution outfit. This company is serious about its product, excited about its slate of films and interested in doing business.
Sogepaq International is a joint-venture between production companies Sogetel and Vicente Gómez' own Iberoamericana Films Internacional. The company distributes a wide range of feature films and specials. While Two Much will soon make its U.S. debut, its great performance at theaters is already old news in Spain. The newest projects coming out of Sogepaq International include the winner of six Spanish Goyas (Spain's Academy Awards), Alex de la Iglesia's El día de la bestia (The Day of the Beast), which debuted at MIFED. It screened at the AFM and is the blackest, funniest, socially incisive, comedic, manic display of apocalyptic pandemonium on a Christmas Eve ever shown on screen. It features a bookish priest who has unlocked a numeric code in St. John's Book of Revelation that reveals a date, not when the world will end, but when the end of the world will begin -- the day the Antichrist will be born! Unfortunately for the priest, the day is TOMORROW -- Christmas Eve -- and he has less than a day to embrace Satan, trick him into revealing where the infant will appear and then kill the child. Original, if not wonderfully disturbing fare, to say the least. The hapless priest, with the aid of a head-banging, acid-dropping troglodyte who runs a death-metal record store, kidnaps a scheming TV parapsychologist-come-evangelist and forces him to help get the deed done. Hailed as Spain's "Quentin Tarantino" (a moniker that should go away if U.S. audiences actually see El día de la Bestia and realize the director's originality warrants remembering his name), Alex de la Iglesia is already moving forward on his next project, also under the watchful eye of Vicente Gómez. Perdita Durango was adapted for the screen by David Trueba (co-writer of Two Much ) from Barry Gifford's 59 Degrees and Raining, and is the follow-up to the Nicholas Cage knock out Elvis-impersonating ("What'da you faggots want?") mind-blower from David Lynch, Wild at Heart. Victoria Abril is set to star and, according to whispers from de la Iglesia himself, John Leguizamo may be cast as the male lead. As an aside, the soundtrack to El día de la Bestia combined an orchestral score by Italian composer Battista Lena, commissioned songs such as the rap title track by Def con Dios, and 14 other death-metal tracks by local headbangers. By the end of January, the soundtrack had sold 20,000 units, twice the typical sales of a Spanish movie soundtrack, and is expected to top out at over 40,000 units.
In June 1994, Vicente Gómez' Iberoamericana and Sogetel agreed to a $135 million slate of 24-30 productions in the two years between 1995 and 1997. This deal was the biggest film production initiative in Spanish history and, perhaps most surprisingly, Vicente Gómez is right on track. Sogepaq International, where Vicente Gómez is vice-president, is the theatrical distribution arm of what is dubbed as Spain's first "mini-major," Prisa, a 50% owner of Sogetel and Spain's largest publishing and communications group. Prisa's reach envelopes all media including film production (Sogetel), theatrical distribution (Sogepaq International), TV and international sales (Sogepaq, co-owned with Canal Plus France), pay TV (joint venture between Canal Plus España and Canal Plus France), and satellite and cable (Sogecable, a subsidiary of Canal Plus España). Just prior to MIFED '95, Sogepaq International formally merged the international sales divisions of Sogepaq and Iberoamericana Films. Since the Sogetel-Gómez deal, Sogetel has signed similar but smaller deals with Cesar Benitez (two films) and Jose Luis Olaizolia (three films) per year.
The courteous and confident Vicente Gómez isn't too concerned about a rush of American and Spanish producers trying to copy the successful Two Much formula. "Too few Spanish producers speak English and too few American producers understand the Spanish system of film production," says the producer in perfect English. "I'm interested in talking about film projects, but Hollywood is only interested in talking about deals," he said. "People in Los Angeles never really talk about good stories and good scripts. They don't understand that good stories finance themselves! Find a beautiful project and the money comes." Of course, Vicente Gómez admits that building reciprocal relationships with producers in other countries is a great way to spend time while you're searching for that "beautiful" project. "Having deals just isn't enough," he says. The bigger problem comes after you make the production deal. Shortly after signing his historic output agreement with Sogetel, Vicente Gómez mused the real work lay ahead -- actually making the movies.
Sogepaq International displayed an impressive slate of projects at the AFM, not all of which were produced by Vicente Gómez. Films included
Vicente Gómez may be the king of English language co-productions because he knows the Spanish system and can successfully gauge what international audiences want from a film. (Although he did take some heat early last year when the first two films out of his Sogetel deal, El Rey Del Rio from acclaimed Spanish director Manuel Gutiérrez Aragón, and Antartida by Manuel Huerga and starring Ariadna Gil under performed at the box office.) For his Spanish based productions, the producer finds it easy to find Spanish directors the caliber of savvy, English-speaking, Oscar-winning Fernando Trueba, as well as seasoned Spanish crews. The tough element is finding well-known actors who carry a Spanish passport, thus keeping the film eligible for up to a 30% production financing subsidy from the government. Antonio Banderas and Victoria Abril head a very short list. Penélope Cruz and a handful of her cast-mates from Belle Epoque may all soon be in high demand as producers struggle to fill the government production requirements. Co-productions in the Spanish language are much easier to assemble, but English-language film treatment of specific Spanish themes can also be achieved via co-production. Vicente Gómez is assembling a project on the Spanish Inquisition to be directed by Michael Radford, nominated for an Oscar for last year's Italian language Il Postino. The combination of subject matter and Radford's name, along with a few English actors, made that project a simply structured co-production.
Vicente Gómez believes that smaller companies must do more co-productions if they expect to survive in the international marketplace. He also thinks however, that few of his current Spanish peers will actually make films this way because they aren't willing to spend the time it takes to learn the languages, customs and film industry tricks of the co-producing countries. Given his choice, Vicente Gómez would like to make two to four English-language pictures every year and continue to work with talented Spanish directors on subjects that have a bigger, broader appeal outside of Spain. True to this commitment, the producer unveiled at AFM a new production slate of high-profile, European films with international appeal. These include a Spanish-Italian adaptation of the second part of Cervantes' The Quixote with Marcelo Mastroainni playing the lead; two more films with Fernando Trueba, including his return to Spanish-language filmmaking in the Spanish-German co-production La niña de sus ojos about the Nazi Goebbels real-life crush on a contemporary Spanish actress; the Radford directed film about the Spanish Inquisition; El embrujo de Shanghai (Shanghai Gesture) to be shot in China and Barcelona; and Irvin Kirschner's $12 million English-language Minor Key of Love, a fictionalized tale of real events in the life of composer Puccini.
If isolationist, Spanish-only, exclusive productions are dead, then long live the king.
