Comedy provides chuckles for weeks
Bad boss behaviour satirised in lauded Spanish movie
The Good Boss (116 minutes) (M) Screening in cinemas Directed by Fernando Leo´ n de Aranoa
In Spanish with English subtitles Reviewed by Jen Shieff
Here’s a darkly comedic story, poking satirical fun at bad boss behaviour, with a satisfying and memorable outcome. The boss in question, Blanco (Javier Bardem), seems the kindest, most understanding boss imaginable. For him, workplace troubles are unthinkable. He wouldn’t even consider there could be a need for employment lawyers or expensive investigations.
It’s great entertainment, funny, sexy (needs that Mature Audience rating) and an interesting insight into the character of a boss who feels entitled to treat his staff in any way he pleases, smiling while doing devilish things. He’s inherited his industrial scales factory and may well be following generations of badly behaved bosses, trampling on people at every step. But that behaviour ends with him.
Tension mounts when Blanco
announces to his staff, who he claims are his family, that they’re about to be inspected for a regional government award for business excellence. They won’t know when the inspectors are due to visit. They must be ready.
For Blanco, it’s vital the judges are given the impression of a harmonious workplace, but there are problems amongst the staff that he makes light of, or tries to.
Miralles (Manolo Solo) has a marital crisis going on. In an ill-judged, overly trusting moment, Miralles turns to Blanco for help, which narcissist Blanco loves. Meanwhile, Jose (Oscar de la Fuente), an aggrieved employee who’s been sacked, sets up a protest camp in a suitably arid field across the road from the clearly well-heeled scales company. Xavier Bardem does a brilliant job of disguising Blanco’s horror at the prospect of the judges seeing Jose, whose camp increases in size and air of permanence as time goes by.
Writer-director Fernando Leo´ n de Aranoa gives Javier Bardem a perfect opportunity to bring the character of an insincere self-indulgent boss to life, and he does it with such skill and depth that you almost sympathise with him when he meets his nemesis. Young Liliana (Almudena Amor) arrives with warning bells, but he simply can’t hear them.
At the 2022 Goya Awards, The Good Boss received 20 nominations. It won Best Film, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Screenplay and Best Score. It was a good day for Fernando Leo´ n de Aranoa, Javier Bardem and composer Zeltia Montes.
The whole film feels as if it’s on its way to a funeral, and yet it’s light and funny. Yes, there are important messages about not treating your staff as if they’re family when you know full well they are not, and about not implying you are trustworthy when you know you can only be trusted to do what’s good for yourself, but the messages are surprisingly subtly conveyed.
The film could have fallen into farce or overbearing satire, but it doesn’t. It will make you smile a lot in the weeks after you’ve seen it. Highly recommended. Movies are rated: Avoid, Recommended, Highly recommended and Must see
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