Red carpet treatment for ‘The Orphanage’ in New York

20 December 2007

MADRID – The stars of The Orphanage – the horror-cum-love story nominated for 14 Spanish Academy Goya awards – attended the film’s pre-premiere yesterday at Loews Theater, New York. Lead actress Belén Rueda, director Juan Antonio Bayona, producer Guillermo del Toro and scriptwriter Sergio García Sánchez have spent the last month promoting the film across the United States, where it has had a warm reception.

Despite having been nominated as a pre-candidate for the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, Bayona insisted the possibility of winning the coveted award is still "very distant."

"We never expected to come to the United States to show the film," said the director, for whom "Belén is the soul of the movie."

For Rueda, part of the appeal of the film, which tells the sinister tale of a traumatised mother’s love for her son, lies in the fact that, "although it is set in northern Spain, it could be anywhere in the world, and it conveys very basic emotions like fear of death and losing loved ones."

[Copyright EL PAÍS, SL./ R.I 2007]

Subject: Spanish news