''The Goya Murders'' ( es, El asesino de los caprichos, links=no) is a 2019 Spanish-Belgian crime thriller film directed by Gerardo Herrero and written by Ángela Armero which stars Maribel Verdú and

Aura Garrido Aura Garrido Sánchez (born 29 May 1989) is a Spanish film and television actress. She has appeared in such films as ''Stockholm'' as well as the television series '' El ministerio del tiempo''. Early life Garrido was born in Madrid in 1989. Her ...

alongside Roberto Álamo, Ginés García-Millán,

Daniel Grao Daniel Grao Valle (born 17 February 1976) is a Spanish actor. He is known for his performances in television series such as '' Luna, el misterio de Calenda'' or ''Sin identidad'', or his lead role in the biopic miniseries about Mario Conde. Bi ...

and

Ruth Gabriel Ruth Sánchez Bueno (born 10 July 1975), better known as Ruth Gabriel, is a Spanish actress. Biography Ruth Sánchez Bueno (her real name) was born in San Fernando (province of Cádiz) on 10 July 1975, daughter of actor Ismael Abellán and wr ...

Plot

A couple of police investigators with different backgrounds and antagonistic personalities (Carmen Cobos and Eva González) track a serial killer who starts to leave a trail of crime scenes mirroring the scenes from

Francisco Goya Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes (; ; 30 March 174616 April 1828) was a Spanish romantic painter and printmaker. He is considered the most important Spanish artist of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. His paintings, drawings, and ...

's ''

Los caprichos ''Los caprichos'' (''The Caprices)'' is a set of 80 prints in aquatint and etching created by the Spanish artist Francisco Goya in 1797–1798, and published as an album in 1799. The prints were an artistic experiment: a medium for Goya's condem ...

'' in

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

Cast

Production

A Spanish-Belgian co-production, the film was produced by Tornasol and Los asesinatos de Goya AIE alongside Entre Chien et Loup, with the participation of

RTVE The Corporación de Radio y Televisión Española, S.A. (; ), known as Radiotelevisión Española or RTVE, is the state-owned public corporation that assumed in 2007 the indirect management of the Spanish public radio and television service know ...

and Movistar+ and support from ICAA and the Madrid and Navarra regional administrations. It was shot in

Pamplona Pamplona (; eu, Iruña or ), historically also known as Pampeluna in English, is the capital city of the Chartered Community of Navarre, in Spain. It is also the third-largest city in the greater Basque cultural region. Lying at near above ...

and

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

Release

The film screened out of competition at the 52nd

Sitges Film Festival The Sitges Film Festival ( ca, Festival Internacional de Cinema Fantàstic de Catalunya, links=no) is an annual film festival held in Sitges, Spain, specialized in fantasy and horror films, of which it is considered one of the world's foremost in ...

in October 2019. Distributed by A Contracorriente Films, ''The Goya Murders'' was theatrically released in Spain on 18 October 2019.

Reception

Raquel Hernández Luján of ''

HobbyConsolas ''HobbyConsolas'' is a Spanish video game magazine founded in 1991 by Hobby Press and published by Axel Springer SE. The first issue appeared in October 1990. The monthly magazine offers information about games for all consoles, and since 2012 ha ...

'' scored 58 out of 100 points ("so-so"), considering that "its anticlimactic script squanders a visually appealing" premise, assessing the Verdú and Garrido duo to be the best thing about the film, while citing the focus on a personal debacle instead of the police subplot, the characters making stupid decisions and the "disappointing" ending as the worst elements about it. Mireia Mullor of '' Fotogramas'' rated the film 2 out of 5 stars, highlighting the tandem formed by Verdú and Garrido as the best thing about it, while resenting the inability to deliver "anything more than a cliché-filled thriller". Francisco Marinero of '' El Mundos ''Metrópoli'' scored 2 out of 5 stars citing the presence of very skilled performers as a positive point, while pointing out at "a contrived plot with countless clichés of the genre" as a negative point. Janire Zurbano of '' Cinemanía'' gave the film 3 out of 5 stars, considering that it "is predictable from its approach to the composition of its characters", yet it manages to entertain, "while the talent of the Verdú-Garrido tandem does the rest". Javier Ocaña of ''

El País ''El País'' (; ) is a Spanish-language daily newspaper in Spain. ''El País'' is based in the capital city of Madrid and it is owned by the Spanish media conglomerate PRISA. It is the second most circulated daily newspaper in Spain . ''El Pa ...

'' underscored the film to be "entertaining, it has a good pace and some interesting points" yet, in addition to certain unevenness in the supporting performances, the result falls short because of the stereotypes and the plot predictability.

References