Editor

With Manchester's most prolific export now settled in Madrid, Spain returns the favour this March with some of the very finest Spanish films and filmmakers coming to Manchester to celebrate the 10th birthday of ¡Viva! the UK's only Spanish Film Festival. Held annually at Manchester's internationally acclaimed cinema, Cornerhouse, the festival features the best of recent Spanish cinema, a themed section, archive screenings, and special events. This year the programming will expand to encompass film from Spanish-speaking Latin America, some of the hottest cinema in the world. Adding to the party atmosphere Cornerhouse's new partnership with Spanish wine brand Osborne/Solaz provides audiences with great Spanish film and wine
- a heady combination!

This year's fiesta has something to appeal to all tastes, from an intimate portrait of a traditional Mexican alcoholic beverage and its dwindling aficionados to the top two Spanish box office hits of 2003.

Highlights include: BASQUE BALL. THE SKIN AGAINST THE STONE: Julio Medem's impassioned and poetic documentary redresses skewed representations of Basque nationalism in a polyphonic blend of interviews, archive clips, and contemporary footage. A plea for dialogue and a subjective portrait of contemporary Euskadi/Pais Vasco from one of its most famous sons.

2004 Oscar-nominated documentary BALSEROS (CUBAN RAFTERS) traces seven years in the lives of seven Cubans who took to the sea in rickety rafts in a bid to reach Florida. From Havana to Guantanamo Bay to Albuquerque, this is a moving portrait of dislocation and dreams.

FOOTBALL DAYS: From the team who made the highest-grossing Spanish film ever (EL OTRO LADO DE LA CAMA), an ensemble comedy in which a gang of thirty-something guys attempt to stave off the onslaught of middle age and boost their egos by re-forming the winning football team of their youth. The second-highest grossing Spanish film (in Spain) in 2003.

The top-grossing Spanish film in its homeland in 2003, MORTADELO & FILEMON: THE BIG ADVENTURE brings to life the eponymous Spanish comic heroes (over 80 million comics sold worldwide) in a bumbling spy caper that makes Inspector Clouzot look like James Bond. The director was previously famous for circulating on the web films of his mother booting his baby son across the garden (and onto Graham Norton).

Flares, flicks, and fellatio. ¿Eres tu? Set in the seventies, black comedy TORREMOLINOS 73 reveals how a mild-mannered encyclopaedia salesman and his wife became celebrities in Scandinavia as the king and queen of Spanish porn. But all he really wanted to be was Ingmar Bergman. Stars Javier Cámara (TALK TO HER) and Candela Peña (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER). Then audiences can shake their groove thing at the Osborne Solaz 70s party in the café-bar, following the main screening on Sat 27 Mar.

Homage to early Almodóvar, produced by the director's own El Deseo, CHILL OUT! is the story of a luckless family whose shot at the big time is spoiled by the death of a trendy film director. If only they could keep news of his death on ice until after their contract was signed... Features another fantastic turn from Candela Peña and a fab, eighties-influenced soundtrack.

Argentine drama KAMCHATKA stars Cecilia Roth (ALL ABOUT MY MOTHER) and Ricardo Darín (NINE QUEENS) as leftist parents forced to take their two young sons into hiding and change their identities in order to escape being 'disappeared' by the military regime in Buenos Aires 1976.

An intersection of gitanos (gypsies) urban relocation and street-smart flamenco can be found in the lively documentary SEVILLE SOUTHSIDE, a portrait of Seville's crowded Las Tres Mil (The Three Thousand Homes) estate and its people.

To mark the festival's 10th birthday, we've asked a number of guests from past editions and Spanish cineastes to nominate their favourite Spanish film of the past ten years. The resulting sidebar offers a subjective snapshot of Spanish cinema from 1994 - 2003. Contributors include directors Julio Medem (¡Viva! 1999), Juanma Bajo Ulloa (¡Viva! 1995), actress/director Iciar Bollain (¡Viva! 2000), actors Fele Martínez (¡Viva! 1998 and co-star of the upcoming Almodóvar), Juan José Ballesta (¡Viva! 2001), journalists Jennifer Green (Iberian correspondent, Screen International, ¡Viva! 2002), Gregorio Belinchón (El País, ¡Viva! 2000), and more.

The festival also hosts an exciting programme of special events from a symposium on Spanish cinema, informal talks to guest introductions.

Audiences unable to make it to the fiesta in Manchester can still sample a great selection of Spanish films from March until June when the festival tours the UK (and to Dublin).