Alcarràs (film)

Alcarràs is a 2022 Spanish-Italian drama film directed by Carla Simón. It is set and shot in Alcarràs, Catalonia, featuring a non-professional cast of Catalan-speaking actors. The plot is a family drama about the disappearance of traditional peach-harvesting activities. It won the Golden Bear at the 72nd Berlinale, becoming the first Catalan-language film to do so. The film was selected as the Spanish entry for the Best International Feature Film at the 95th Academy Awards, but did not make the shortlist.

Plot
Set in the Catalan town of Alcarràs, the plot is a rural family drama concerning the disappearance of agricultural activities, revolving around the intention to install solar panels in an agricultural plot hitherto occupied by a peach orchard, bringing the members of the Solé family to a stand-off.

Production
The screenplay was written by director Carla Simón and Arnau Vilaró. The film was produced by Avalon PC, Elastica Films, Vilaüt Films, Kino Produzioni, and TV3, with the participation of TVE and Movistar+ and the support of ICAA, ICEC (Catalonia), Creative Europe's MEDIA, Eurimages, MIBACT, and Provincial Deputation of Lleida. Shooting began on 1 June 2021 in the area of Alcarràs, province of Lleida, with the shooting window constrained to summer due to the film's setting based on peach harvest cycles. The cast is formed of non-professional actors from the province of Lleida. Shot in Catalan, the entire cast used the local Western dialect (Lleidatà) of the Catalan language. Filming wrapped after 8 weeks of shooting. María Zamora, Stefan Schmitz, Tono Folguera, and Sergi Moreno are credited as producers.

Release
The film was screened in the official competition of the 72nd Berlinale on 15 February 2022. The film was also screened at the Málaga Festival on 19 March 2022. Initially announced to run as part of the festival's official competition, the festival and the film's producers agreed to screen the film out of competition instead.

Co-distributed by Avalon DA and Elastica Films in Spain, the film was theatrically released on 29 April 2022. Starting with a distribution to 169 theatres, the film was the most watched debut film in its opening weekend, and second film overall (first in Catalonia) after The Northman. Distributed by Wonder Pictures, it opened in Italian theatres on 26 May 2022. The film was selected for the 60th New York Film Festival's main slate. By August 2022, the film had grossed around €2.2 million at the Spanish box office. In December of that year, it was invited to the 28th Kolkata International Film Festival and was screened there on 17 December 2022.

Critical reception
According to the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, Alcarràs has a 92% approval rating based on 53 reviews from critics, with an average rating of 8.2/10. The critical consensus on the website reads: "While it may lack a narrative punch, Alcarràs captures this rural world and its heritage with a gripping sense of nostalgia for things forever gone." On Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, the film holds a score of 85 out of 100 based on 19 reviews, indicating “universal acclaim.”

Reviewing the film for The Daily Telegraph, Tim Robey rated the film 5 out of 5 stars, saying that the film "manages a light, improvisatory mastery, an immaculate hold on tone, and a grave yet sunlit tableau of an ending, with each one of these faces turned in collective mourning, that I'll never forget". Fionnuala Halligan of ScreenDaily wrote that Alcarràs constitutes a "profoundly authentic and moving contemplation of the fragility of family, and, again, childhood" and has "all the hallmarks of a very specific film with emotionally wide appeal, a thoughtful essay which can also rattle and hum".

Guy Lodge of Variety wrote that Alcarràs confirmed "the strength and consistency of Simón's directorial voice" after Summer 1993, also writing that it "balances a bristling political conscience against its tenderly observed domestic drama". Writing for Little White Lies, Caitlin Quinlan said that the film "strikes a deft balance between idyllic reminiscence and melancholy for a cherished place", while also "delivering a poignant tale about the impact of industrial development on agriculture". Sergi Sánchez of Fotogramas wrote that Simón gets to "translate into images what many neorealist filmmakers pursued unceasingly," which is "truth, this time of a changing space and time, which appeals to the collective without losing the thread of the individual".

In August 2022, Alcarràs was announced as one of three films shortlisted by the Academy of Cinematographic Arts and Sciences of Spain to be the Spanish submission to the 95th Academy Awards for Best International Feature Film alongside Rodrigo Sorogoyen's The Beasts and Alauda Ruiz de Azúa's Lullaby. Alcarràs ultimately was then official submission for the category.

Top ten lists
The film appeared on a number of critics' top ten lists of the best European films of 2022:

In addition, it also appeared on top ten lists of the best Spanish films of 2022: