‘Politically incorrect’: the political consensus is in a mutual sexual heat | Culture

You could say that politically incorrect It is a political satire, but the concept is so enormous that it will have to be reduced. To enjoy such a rating there would have to be a speech, provoke a debate, have subversive intentions and a capacity for irony and mordacity, be incisive and even hurtful, in addition to managing to find entertainment and, of course, humor. But Arantxa Echevarría’s new film, written by Olatz Arroyo, lacks all of this.

A political astracanada, then? Something closer, especially regarding the astracanada, although the last name “politics” should be replaced by “set in politics”, which is not the same. Because here, despite the fact that the film is developed around the electoral campaign of the two main political parties of our country, renamed Spain Liberal and New Left, of the president of the Government and the leader of the opposition, and mainly of their new and young number twos, both coming from the youth base of each of the parties, there is hardly any political or social reflection beyond a load of clichés that any one could release troll on a bad afternoon of social media.

A romantic comedy with overtones of astracanada, developed around politics, the media and public opinion, focused on social networks? That’s where we’re going better. As one could also speak of a lost opportunity. One more, like so many others when recent Spanish cinema has approached from pure comedy to the heights of political power, polarization, the weakness of ideals and the practice of corruption: Atilano, president (1998) and some more, always in memory.

“A red one” who does not utter a single idea in the entire film and “a fascist” who can only be distinguished by the vest and belt with the flag of Spain become, by the work and grace of a mistake that cannot be completely be understood in the script, in the number two of each of their parties in the face of the elections and the television debates. So much for politics. Meanwhile, due to another even more far-fetched and unlikely affair (the astracanada is by nature), they end up feeling an overwhelming sexual attraction between them after being trapped for a night in a lonely place that forces them to help each other. And that’s it, the romance.

The first half hour, exactly the one that occupies the beginning of the relationship in a forest next to a swamp, which for them is like a desert island, is infamous. It is even shocking that this entire passage has passed some quality filter in the film’s production process. Then, a string of commonplaces about “freedom”, the conflicts with the nationalist environment, the Francoist heritage or the forced deletion of tweets, without grace or imagination. Elena Irureta, the president, has been dressed and made up so that she looks like Esperanza Aguirre, and the rest of the performers do what they can with some script lines and some crazy situations (Pepa Aniorte is the one who comes out the best). Among dozens of verbal jokes and gags Physically, only a couple of them hit the target: one on the distance between generations, around the two rhombuses; and another about dog poop.

Far from his most personal films (Carmen and Lola, and the wonderful Chinese), Arantxa Echevarría also does not achieve anything salvageable with staging and editing, in the second of its professional aspects, that of commissioned works such as The perfect family, also written by Arroyo. In a polarized country, it is assumed that with politically incorrect Cohesion is sought through laughter and what may perhaps be the best glue between Spaniards from both extremes: the political consensus is in a mutual sexual warm-up.

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