‘Calle Malaga’ Review: Carmen Maura’s Splendid Performance Highlights Morocco’s Official International Oscar Entry – Toronto Film Festival
The audience award winner in the Spotlight section of the Venice Film Festival, and having its North American premiere today at the Toronto International Film Festival, Moroccan director Maryam Touzani’s crowd pleasing Malaga street is a lovely ode to growing old but not giving in to age, to living life as it is meant to be lived – on your own terms.
The film from Touzani, whose acclaimed 2022 The Blue Caftan was on the Oscar shortlist, is also a gift for beloved Spanish star Carmen Maura (Women On The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown, Volver) who is best known for her long association with Pedro Almodovar but here gets a full blown lead as a widow trying to outsmart her daughter and remain in her home on a sunny street in Tangiers.
That is how we meet Maria Angeles, a 74 year old who has daily routines with the street vendors, knows everyone by their first name, and has settled into a wonderful domestic bliss spending her days in peace, listening to her favorite music on her treasured record player. When her daughter, Clara (Marta Etura) comes to visit she is at first happy, but soon not so much when Clara, going through a nasty divorce and dealing with her kids and short of money, announces she is selling Maria’s house and her childhood home.
She can do that because her father signed it over to her shortly before he died in order to make things go more smoothly. Maria fights this idea but the choice is simple: either come back to live with her in Madrid or move into the local retirement home where one cherished spot has opened up and to get it they have to decide quickly. Finally rather than fight, Maria goes along with choice #2. Clara brings in a dealer, Abslaine (a perfect Ahmed Boulane) to buy up the furnishings and items (including that prized record player) and moves Maria into the home.
She should have thought about this since Maria has devious plans of her own. After a rocky few first days she announces to the staff she has decided to move to Madrid after all, gathers her things, and summons her faithful friend and driver. Only they aren’t going to the airport, but rather back to her home which is empty but still unsold. Suddenly Maria is a squatter, but a savvy one. She slowly buys back all her furniture piecemeal and puts the life she had back together like a puzzle. Unfortunately the record player was sold but that will become another part of this adventure retrieving it. Abslaine drives her to where they will find it, and this is all part of a budding romance, an unexpected late in life sexual relationship that goes along with her renewed spirit.
To make money Maria schemes to sell spots in her living room to the locals, young and old sports fans, to watch the football games on her television, It is party time! She also bribes the real estate agent not to tell her daughter she no longer is at the home but instead is home.
The lilting Malaga street, Morocco’s official entry for the International Film Oscar, is a joy largely because of its veteran star who envelops the screen and grabs a role of a career. Maura is as good as it gets, and the script by Touzani and her husband Nabil Ayouch may be breezy and without a whole lot of complexity, it still amusingly and poignantly delivers exactly what the older art house viewers will be lining up for. There is no doubt in my mind why it became an audience winner in Venice, and perhaps might be again in Toronto with their new People’s Choice International Award this year.
Products are ayouch, amine Benjellon, Jean-Reti Dourtsioux
Title: Malaga street
Festival: Venice (Spotlight), Toronto Film Festival (Special Presentations
Sales Agent: Films Boutique
Director: Maryam Touzani
Screenplay: Maryam Touzani and Nabil Ayouch
Cast: Carmen Maura, Marta Etura, Ahmed Boulane, María Alfonsa Rosso, Miguel Garcés
Running Time: 1 hour and 56 minutes
