FILM REVIEW: CELDA 211

IES JOSEP MIQUEL GUARDIA

Lluis Vergés and Diego Robredo, sixth form

We are going to talk a bout this Spanish movie that we both enjoyed watching.

The movie, directed by Daniel Monzón was a big favourite with 16 nominations and won eight Goyas, the most important cinema awards in Spain, including those for Best Film, Best Director for Monzón, Best Leading Actor for Luis Tozar, Best Supporting Actress for Marta Etura, Best Upcoming Actor for Alberto Amman, Best Editing Mapa Pastor, Best sound and Best Adapted Screenplay.

The film starts when Juan visits the prison on his first day of work as a prison officer. While two of the prison officers are showing him the prison, a chunk of ceiling falls down and he gets hurt. At the same time, Malamadre, one of the convicts, leads a riot, so the officers leave Juan unconscious and alone at the cell number 211. He must pretend to be a prisoner to survive, so he quickly changes his clothes. When the other prisoners find him, he’s taken to the leader of the riot, Malamadre, who is making a speech to the others. Juan explains he’s a new prisoner who just arrived when the riot started. After gaining the confidence of Malamadre, he suggests him not to break the surveillance cameras to control what prison authorities can see and to send messages to the outside world. At the same time, Utrilla and Armando, the jail officers, are trying to deal with the problem.

The GEOS, the Spanish official counterterrorist unit, can’t irrupt into the prison because the revolted prisoners have taken four ETA (the militant Basque separatist organization) prisoners hostage and the government is afraid of ETA’s reaction if any of their members is killed. They decide to send a negotiator to talk to Malamadre who gives them claims and conditions for stopping the revolt. Juan is now Malamadre’s right hand and very popular among the convicts except for Apache and Tachuela who hate and can’t trust him.

Out of the prison, everybody wants to know what is happening; Juan’s wife Elena, who is pregnant, is right there when a fight happens between the police and jail officers, and she gets hurt by Utrilla by accident.

Juan will find out the death of his wife on TV from the prison and he gets completely crazy. When Utrilla goes to have a talk to the mutineers, Juan kills him. He’s not a jail officer trying to stop the riot anymore, now he’s one of them and he will fight with them.

We loved this movie where the characters are very violent and cruel, but intelligent and moving at the same time. Its complex plot is very tense, realistic and is developed at a frantic pace. The actors perform their characters very well and convincing, and all these things make us believe that Cell 211 is one of the best Spanish films we have ever watched.