El camino

I went to watch this film with my friends Alan and Alex, at the Cine Lumiere, the cinema which is part of the Alliance Francaise in South Kensington.  It is a beautiful building, with a wonderful marble staircase, and the cinema seats are super comfy with loads of leg room.  The film was being shown as part of a Spring weekend Spanish film festival.  It stars Martin Sheen as an american opthalmologist whose son dies at the beginning of walking the Camino de Santiago, the 900km pilgrims walk from the French / Spanish border to Santiago de Compostela in North Western Spain.  The father decides to continue the journey on the son's behalf.  Having done a small part of the Camino about three years ago (in a group which included Alex and Alan) I was intrigued to see a film about it.  However, I found the film quite disappointing - the plot was pretty simplistic at times (e.g. gypsies are bad people; oh no they aren't really), and they didn't seem to make the most of the wonderful scenery in northern Spain.  It was still kind of nice for me to re-immerse myself in the experience of walking el camino - the character encounters quite a few wierd and wonderful people on the trip.  However, overall I would probably only give the film a five out of ten.  The film is directed by one of Sheen's sons, Emilio Estevez (Sheen's original surname is Estevez - his Spanish parents moved to the US).  Emilio also stars as the son in the film, who comes back as an apparition to his father occasionally.  Watch out for the scene with the amazing flying incense burner in the cathedral at Santiago - the priests do an amazing job with ropes and pulleys to get it swiging at great speed along the length of the cathedral.  One useful piece of information for me is that there is a two week long Spanish film festival in London in September.