13/04/2022 - For his debut feature, the filmmaker who is a veteran of animation has benefitted from the production of Pedro Hernández and performances from Eneko Sagardoy and Natalia de Molina

(© Abraham García Blázquez)

José Corral Llorente, 45 years old, premieres his first feature film on 13 April, Contando ovejas [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: José Corral Llorente
film profile], a black comedy starring Eneko Sagardoy, Natalia de Molina and Juan Grandinetti, and also featuring the voices of Julián Villagrán, Manolo Solo and José Luis García-Pérez. Sponsored by Pedro Hernández, of Aquí y Allí Films, it is a co-production with Argentina that is very daring.

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Cineuropa: You have experience in animation...
José Corral Llorente: Yes, I come from animation, as I've made a living doing 3D for advertising while trying to find time to make my short films. Down by Love took me three years to complete, with hardly any holidays. I did them on my own, as it is very hard to get someone to work for free for such a long time. After that job, in 2016, I packed up, left Madrid and went to the Canary Islands.

One of your short films is called Dark Side. Do you have a dark side?
That short film doesn't represent me very much, because it was a kind of half-commission, but yes, I have a very dark side: I live in a place as bright as the Canary Islands, but shut-in. There have been people who have wondered watching Contando Ovejas if I have an illness of some kind... So is Christopher Nolan ill too? And David Lynch? Or David Cronenberg? My mother, who knows me well, saw the film and was not scared. You have to dissociate the creator from his work and, in fact, I am now directing a children's film, without a drop of blood.

Maybe making films like Contando ovejas can be therapeutic....
But the first version of the script was nine years ago, and I have changed. With these long processes, when you finish the work you are someone different from when you started. Being in the Canary Islands, maybe because of the sun and the surf, I felt the need to give more colour and joy to the film by bringing in humour, hipsters and designer drugs. And the character's hobby went from technical drawing to models, and the sheep went from cartoons to papier-mâché and cardboard.

So is animation as present in your life as it is in the life of Eneko Sagardoy's character Ernesto, the protagonist of Contando ovejas?
The living room of my house in Madrid was a workshop: I built the models, watched films, slept there for three years. I met Pedro Hernández six years ago and he gave the green light for the film. He introduced us to a mutual friend who had worked with him. Pedro is someone who is open to projects and makes films that are very different from one another, he falls in love with a person's art and commits; he leads the way, he is positive and has great energy.

Contando Ovejas discusses the consequences of noise pollution caused by noisy neighbours.
Yes, I have experienced it a lot in flats where I lived. That's why the theme of insomnia and the annoying neighbour has been recurrent in several stories I've written. Now I don't have those sleeping problems anymore, but such an unpleasant situation can drive you crazy.

The sheep in your film are a bit like Brad Pitt in Fight Club, setting aside the differences...
Exactly. The white sheep represents reason; the black sheep is the bruised ego, a characteristic trait of serial killers, who need to satisfy themselves with the feeling of having power over the life and death of another person, without thinking about the consequences; and the brown sheep represents fear, despised by others when it is a defence mechanism. Everyone has these three things inside.

And why this hatred of hipsters in your film? It reminds me of Álex de la Iglesia's Acción mutante.
It is not so much a hatred of hipsters, but a contrast with the inhabitants of the building where the film is set. They are a carefree and unrestrained people, who enjoy life and do not belong to the dark world of that house. They are two worlds at odds with each other.

And at times, watching the film, you feel like you're walking into a rave.
The party scene looks like it belongs in another film, with everything overexaggerated. We reached a certain point during filming that I think it comes through and it works: the party was difficult to film, with the Covid measures and the smoke, but in the end it came through in the performance of the actors. In those moments you go somewhere else that doesn’t feel like it is in the building where all the action takes place.

(Translated from Spanish by Vicky York)