FAMILIA RODANTE aka ROLLING FAMILY

Year: 2004
USA: Palm Pictures
UK: Artificial Eye
Cast: Graciana Chironi, Liliana Capuro, Ruth Dobel, Federico Esquerro, Bernardo Forteza, Laura Glave, Leila Gomez, Nicolas Lopez, Marianela Pedano, Carlos Resta, Raul Vinona
Director: Pablo Trapero
Country: Argentina / Spain / Germany / Brazil
Language: Spanish (English subtitles)
USA & UK: 99 mins
UK Certificate: 15 contains strong language
USA Release Date: 8 September 2006 (Limited Release - New York)
UK Release Date: 18 November 2005
US Distributor
UK Distributor

Synopsis

FAMILIA RODANTE, a moving road-movie about family relationships, is the latest film by the brilliant new Argentinean director Pablo Trapero. The film premiered in the Horizons Programme of the Venice Film Festival and follows Trapero's previous acclaimed films Mundo Grúa and El Bonaerense. The young director based the story on his own experiences and the anecdotes of family and close friends. Thirty years ago, his father built the camper-van (casa rodante in Spanish) we see in the movie, and during their holidays Trapero's family spent years travelling to remote corners of Argentina in the van.

FAMILIA RODANTE begins on the day of the 84th birthday celebration of Grandma Emilia, when her disparate family gathers to pay homage to their matriarch. They are unaware of the bombshell she's about to drop: she's been invited to be the matron of honour at her niece's wedding in the remote village where she was brought up, over a thousand kilometres away from Buenos Aires, and expects them all to go with her. Unable to defend themselves against the heavy dose of emotional blackmail she lays on them, thirteen members of four generations of the same family cram into the back of an old camper van and set off.

In this confined space, as the days pass and the van hobbles its way towards its destination, emotions start to ride high and old grudges and jealousies start bubbling to the surface, along with well kept secrets and sexual tensions, new and past.

Excruciating and hilarious in equal measure in its raw depiction of family politics, director Pablo Trapero's own grandmother, a non-professional actress, plays the family matriarch lending the film reality, charm and sympathy.

"How do Past and Present coexist at 80? How does it feel getting up every morning without the conviction that one's entire life lies ahead waiting to be lived? The only certainty is that the closest is Death. Emilia gets up every morning thinking about these things, knowing that what will help her get through the hours is the company of her pets, her friends and her family. Every mile travelled will force her to review past emotions and stir 84 years of recollections. But Emilia, her children, and her grandchildren will not talk about this. Meanwhile life will run inadvertently, new chapters will tie curious knots that will become future memories."

From the Director: Pablo Trapero

Pablo Trapero was born in Buenos Aires in 1971. His previous feature films are MUNDO GRÚA (1999), shown at the Venice Film Festival (Critics Award), and EL BONAERENSE (2002), which was presented at the 2002 Cannes Film Festival in Un Certain Regard. He also directed NAIKOR, a short film premiered in 2001, and SARASA, a documentary for television (2002). In 2002 he created Matanza Cine, an independent film production company