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Photo via Palmpictures.com
Okay, so I was wrong. This is the worst job interview ever. Director Marcelo Piñeyro and Palm Pictures bring us The Method (El Método) a Spanish film to rival any bad experience we've ever had with HR, especially in the corporate world. In a Madrid full of political unrest, where anti-capitalist protests and riots are engulfing the city, seven testy candidates for a top-profile position at the Dexia Corporation meet for a third and final interview. The film opens with each applicant getting up and making his/her way to the interview, witnessing the disrupted traffic and listening to news of the protesters' demands, in a sequence that involves several panels of action on the screen at once; I found this a little fascinating and also a little headache-inducing, but it dissolved into one panel once they arrive at the office.
Then there is a new headache in the form of Montse, the smug and flirtatious receptionist at Dexia. With a fiercely fake smile, she makes all seven applicants sit in a room to fill out a form, a form they have already completed twice before, and which as Ricardo points out, requests info included in their resumes anyway. Montse snaps a reminder that they are all there of their own accord, and then leaves them to check each other out, and wonder aloud what this "Grönholm Method" is, for which they must sign an agreement.
Suddenly, computer monitors snap to life and the group of candidates is given their first assignment. Enrique, a shifty little guy, explains that this must be one of those group interviews "like in the U.S.", (Eh? Really?), where there could be hidden cameras to observe how well they deal with others, who is the best leader, and which one will emerge as the superior candidate. What follows is some very entertaining and intense scrutiny of each other, heightened by the obvious former relationship between the cold, oversexed Nieves and cocky Carlos, and a bathroom liaison (if you want to call it that) between Nieves and sleazy Fernando (who may or may not know each other also? That part was pretty unclear). Somebody is a false candidate and a mole, someone has a secret excluded from his resume, someone must be voted out of a hypothetical bomb shelter.
The trials bring up some interesting topics, involving honesty, company loyalty, sexism, and a whole lot of downright how-far-will-you-go? And how many people will you trample on the way? The acting is very good, and I did get totally caught up in it (and I'm not even a Survivor fan). Even though I kind of wanted Nieves to get kicked out, and somebody, just one single person, to get up and say, "God dammit, I don't really need this job" and walk right out. The ending is excellent, with a final scene revealing the state of the world outside; it both renders their competition irrelevant and exemplifies it in the extreme.
The movie is available on DVD starting August 14th or you can check out Palm Pictures' online store. Or if you're in San Diego next Friday, you can catch a screening at UltraStar Mission Valley Cinemas.
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