Luis Tosar premieres “All the Names of God”, which has just entered Spanish cinemas, with director Daniel Calparsoro. Tosar plays taxi driver Santi in a plot that begins with the terrorist attack at Barajas airport. Suddenly, he will transform into a man full of explosives, roaming Madrid with terror strapped to his body. This is the new challenge of Galician cinema with the production company Vaca Films.
I heard that “All the Names of God” is a thriller with a lot of emphasis on emotion.
A tense thriller. There’s a more salacious component to the emotion here, as my character has to confront an underlying family drama that isn’t presented for the first time in the movie, but which we discover as we learn more about the events.
His character has lost a beloved family member, and this destroys his will to live. Have you looked into your past or the history of someone close to you with depression to establish this?
To experience depression as an illness, unfortunately you always have a more or less immediate reference as you get older. From there we start gathering information. Some are already archived on life’s hard drive, some are acquired when you create the character. As for family losses, many people, including very close friends of mine, died at an early age. But I try to stay away from personal experiences. These are there as the basis of your personality, but I try to give the characters their own identities, create their own experiences for them. I’m trying to make this system work. It is inevitable that you will benefit from the experiences of those fictional lives, but I am trying to build something separate so that it does not pollute my private life.
He spoke with Ibon Etxezarreta, a terrorist who expressed regret for “Maixabel”. Did you deal with any jihadists in this movie?
No, I neither had the opportunity nor was interested because I approach this film from a different perspective. In this movie, I am an ordinary person who has to face an extraordinary situation that gets out of control. If I had the opportunity to receive this advice, the experience would be welcome.
In some of the footage, he walks along Madrid’s empty Gran Vía street, filled with explosives. [y con la que tenemos un flashback a la secuencia de «Abre los ojos « de Amenábar con Noriega solo por dicho vial]He is being followed by groups of agents and soldiers.
We made a great circus. We do not shoot under special conditions. We were a marching demonstration. The first day we arrived was impressive; Gran Vía was empty and closed to us. We had a very limited time to shoot, so we had to be very efficient while working. That’s why we rehearsed the series a lot in other places with that team. We recorded two Sunday mornings at Gran Vía, four hours each day. It was a privilege. I don’t know if it is a historical moment, but it will remain in my memory for a long time. This is an iconic image of my career.
This movie also touches on fake news and the power of image. Could it turn against this society that attaches so much importance to this?
Today we are a society composed almost entirely of images. People do not have the patience to listen, read, compare and research. The power of image is relentless. The movie talks about this a little bit, although I can’t explain too much. It’s about the power of persuasion just by seeing an image. We are a society practically built on indecent exposure. We show what happened to us during the day, the food we ate, the gym, the views we saw… We constantly spread it throughout our lives on social networks. What’s happening? Of course, everything we build is part of a great castle that is not supported by strong enough pillars. This type of imaginary construction that we permanently construct with idyllic images is an opium tool that helps us move forward even if problems persist.
As if it were a smokescreen against social problems.
Some structural problems of our society, some problems such as the purchasing power gap, still continue. We are apparently happier because the fundamental evils of our society are still there and unresolved. We can say whatever we want and convince almost anyone that it is true. The complicated thing is uncovering the truth of things because people would rather believe a good lie when it’s well told. This seems like an unspoken agreement we made between us, and it’s incredible that we’ve gotten to this point.
As a father of two, aren’t you worried about your children’s education?
I have all the doubts you could have. I talk to parents who are in the same parenting and age situation, and we are all in the same situation. It is becoming increasingly easier to manipulate reality and manipulate a world that appears to have become real but is not due to the power received by artificial intelligence. Children also have a relationship with screens and the outside world, which in some cases becomes more important than the world you can touch. Damn, it’s a struggle and a constant conversation. There is hardly a day that goes by that I don’t talk about this topic.
Given the advancement of cinema, it is becoming increasingly difficult to persuade people to fill cinemas…
I feel like the situation is starting to turn around a bit. Of course, he will not be able to reach his old level. There is a minimal recovery among people of a certain age who are hesitant to go to the cinema [por la pandemia]. I also feel that the boom in platform consumption is trending downward. I am a person of faith.