Scriptwriter Philippa Goslett and director Paul Morrison ask us to take an interest in three pretentious students in post-WWI Spain on the grounds that their names are Federico García Lorca, Luis Buñuel, and Salvador Dalí. Inasmuch as all three are dark young men of similar age, it would be difficult to tell them apart if one of them, Dalí, were not Robert Pattinson, easily distinguishable as the teen vampire of Twilight, and did not wear ruffled cuffs and collar. The other two are Javier Beltrán and Matthew McNulty, Lorca and Buñuel respectively, and less distinguishable. It gets easier to keep them straight, so to speak, once Dalí and Lorca pair off for homoerotic escapades such as an idyllic spin on stolen bicycles and a slo-mo moonlight swim. Buñuel further sets himself apart by throwing a homophobic snit fit and drifting off to Paris, where he will soon be joined by the fickle Dalí to make an out-of-sequence Chien Andalou. (The sliced eyeball should come first.) Lorca ultimately achieves heroic stature in the Spanish Civil War, while Dalí settles for hypocritical stature. Cognoscenti might get an occasional chuckle out of it (Lorca to Buñuel: “I thought you wanted to be an entomologist”) as long as they don’t mind the air of condescension. (2009) — Duncan Shepherd
This movie is not currently in theaters.