Timecrimes is a new the suspense thriller straight out of the Spanish mind of director, Nacho Vigalondo, a young energetic fan of, Hitchcock, Philip K. Dick and karoake. It's a brainteasing story involving time travel and murder, and a sense of the comedic.

Hector (Karra Ejejalde) and his wife Clara (Candela Fernandez) are renovating a home in the countryside. While relaxing in his yard, Hector happens to catch site of a beautiful, naked woman (Barbara Goenaga) as he peers through his binoculars. Naturally, he goes to investigate, setting off a strange series of events involving, a pink bandaged, trench coated monster, a time machine and well, that's all that can be divulged at this time.

The story comes from director Vigalondo's love of time travel and science fiction stories. "I've been into science fiction all my love" he admits, "I wanted to make, to take this feeling into the movies...this complexity but at the same time this funny element." He wrote many drafts of the screenplay, and the Rear Window-like crime element including a femme fatale and "the invisible man with scissors" materialized. He likes to think of it as two of his favorite things coming together, a sort of Hitchcock goes science fiction.

Everybody worships Hitchcock, especially thriller geeks but Vigalondo didn't want to do an explicit "homage" even though as he says, "when I was shooting this script I had Psycho in my laptop...I wanted to make this kind of inspired by Psycho.'' And the film has some resonances without any direct quotations of scenes. He says there are hidden jokes rather than obvious, "see here this is just like that scene in Vertigo" moments. Perhaps the biggest influence has to do with the way, as Vigalondo puts it, Hitchcock manages to combine the "sinister and the silly" in films as disparate as The Birds, The Trouble With Harry and Shadow of a Doubt.

Vigalondo cites the Italian "giallos" (horror, crime thriller genre films) as another influence, especially in their approach to color. Dario Argento with Profondo Rosso and Suspiria, the "Italian stuff" he calls it, as well as Lamberto and Mario Vava. He calls the giallos a crazy version of Hitchcock and says this is also what Brian de Palma has done in America, particularly with homages like Body Double.

Vigalondo says actually writing the script was a bit of a nightmare since the plot is so puzzle like. "I made this kind of drawing...and I made all the details not only in horizontal but in vertical." Things had to match but the film needed to stay funny, presenting an extra challenge. It had to work in both a mathematical way as well as be emotionally compelling. "It's not that difficult to make a mathematical equation and solve it. What is difficult is to make a funny mathematical equation."

The humor element is very important to Vigalondo because he believes that movies should be fun, at least that's what he likes about them. Some of this other favorite directors are the ones who break down the barrier between humor and action/drama like Don Segal in the Dirty Harry films, Tarantino and even The French Connection.
Finally Vigalondo wants the audience to find it's own way in this and all of his films. He finds there is too much guiding in many films and he prefers to play with his audience. Take the naked girl in the forest, what he refers to as his "Russ Meyer situation." If you stop there, he says, maybe you think it's an erotic film or a comedy. But what is finally great here is that you really have no idea where it's going, not even at the very end. It's like a "labrynth" where you can get lost inside", which is exactly where Nacho Vigalondo hopes you end up.

Timecrimes opens December 12, 2008

Written and Directed by Nacho Vigalondo; produced by Esteban Ibarretxe, Eduardo Caerneros, and Javier Ibarretxe; cinematography by Flavio Labiano; edited by Jose Luis Romeu; music by Chucky Namanera. Released by Magnet. Running time: 89 minutes.

With:Karra Elejalde (Hector), Nacho Vigalondo (Chico/Boy), Candela Fernandez (Clara) and Barbara Goenaga (Chica/Girl).