Spain, 2000
Review:
JA Kerswell
An intriguing mix of I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER (1997) and THE SIXTH SENSE (1999), THE ART OF DYING was the most financially successful of all the Spanish slashers released in the post-SCREAM (1996) period. A group of friends hide a secret for four years following the accidental death of a friend during a prank, but are brought together again when the case is reopened by the police. After a bungled attempt to hide evidence of their guilt, they start to die one-by-one by the hands of a shadowy killer. Great production values and quality acting make for a twisty - if surprisingly atypical - take on the subgenre.
THE ART OF DYING teases the fate of a conceited young artist, Nacho (Gustavo Salmerón sporting perhaps the worst haircut of 2000), but doesn’t immediately show what actually happened to him. His friends become weary of his behaviour at a showing of his morbid artwork themed around death - called The Art of Dying. So they decide to play a trick on him to teach him a lesson. His best friend Ivan (Fele Martínez) tells Nacho that the group are going to party at an old abandoned building in the countryside and that he must come along …
Fast forward four years and the police have reopened the case into his disappearance after finding Nacho’s ID card on a junkie they have recently arrested. Ivan is still haunted by past events. He has become so emotionally distant that his girlfriend Clara (María Esteve) decides to leave him and move in with their mutual friend Patricia (Lucía Jiménez). News of the police investigation brings the group back together with the other members who were there that night - Ramón (Sergio Peris-Mencheta), Carlos (Adrià Collado) and Candela (Elsa Pataky). They had previously stuck to a story and told the police they had gone camping without Nacho - and had no idea what had happened to him. Worried that the authorities will find his body if they investigate the abandoned building where they said they were, they return to retrieve it. However, when a butane lamp is overturned the place turns into an inferno and they barely escape with their lives. Turning back to the fire after fleeing, Ivan sees a figure silhouetted against the flames and initially thinks one of the group is missing; only to discover that everyone is accounted for - meaning someone else is there.
Returning to the city they try to act normally, but as the police become more insistent in their questioning the group start to be picked off by a mystery killer. Has Nacho returned from the grave? Or has someone discovered their secret and is out to exact revenge? Or is something even stranger going on?
THE ART OF DYING keeps the audience guessing as to what exactly is unfolding. However, it soon becomes apparent that perhaps something supernatural is afoot. For much of the time, we don’t see a killer, but we know that he or she is there. Increasingly the film takes on a dream-like logic, with, for instance, characters finding themselves in a different building when walking through a doorway. This dislocation from reality is cleverly evoked further by Ivan’s apartment, which becomes ever more sparsely furnished every time we see it until it is almost empty. Eerily, many of the victims find themselves alone in what should be crowded places - such as a previously busy bar or underground car park - before they are murdered. Ivan is repeatedly haunted by visitations from the dead Nacho, which leads Carla to question whether he is losing his sanity. The film even references the ghosts of Shakespeare - such as Banquo in Macbeth - but as a hallucination and manifestation of guilt rather than anything specifically supernatural. References to the paintings of medieval painter Hieronymus Bosch give a clue to what is actually going on. I guess it could be said that the film has something of an arthouse sensibility, but not so much that blunts its subgenre roots - although those looking for more traditional stalk and slash may be disappointed.
THE ART OF DYING is boosted by some very effective performances, especially Fele Martínez as the tortured Ivan. Martínez had previously appeared in Alejandro Amenábar’s breakout thriller hit THESIS (1996) and went on to appear in the more conventional post-SCREAM slasher TUNO NEGRO the following year in 2001; before a successful run of collaborations with Pedro Almodóvar. Director Álvaro Fernández Armero was mostly known for his comedies, so it is surprising that there is zero comic relief here and the material is played straight.
Despite its rather esoteric approach, THE ART OF DYING was very much promoted in Spain in the SCREAM and I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER mould - with posed group shots of the cast dressed in the trendiest millenium threads and staring moodily at the camera. It was filmed in 1999 and released to screens in March 2000, where it benefitted by being the first of the post-SCREAM home-produced slashers in Spain. It was a sizeable hit with audiences with 821,513 admissions.
Not for every taste. Arguably it could have lifted more of the post-modern slasher elements of the movies that inspired it, but it is still an intriguing time for those wanting something a bit different.
BODY COUNT 7:
Female 3 / Male 4
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Trailer for THE ART OF DYING (2000)