If the geniuses do not abound, that more than one arises in a few kilometers around is a rarity. And isn’t Cap de Creus a rarity as a landscape? Perhaps it is in this coincidence that we must look for the reason why two of the most admired Catalan artists on the whole planet were almost neighbors. We are talking about Salvador Dalí and Ferran Adrià. Both figures and those who were their accomplices have inspired the film Waiting for Dalí, by director David Pujol and by Alfa Pictures, in which the landscape is as central as the characters that inhabit it.
A few months after it passed through the official section of the Malaga Festival, out of competition, and about to hit theaters tomorrow, the film was screened yesterday at the Verdi in Barcelona, ??in a preview presented by the journalist Víctor Amela , who gracefully interviewed the director and actors, before a mostly gastronomic audience. There was Albert Adrià, who joked with his alter ego, the excellent actor Pol López, before the screening began. “You’ll like it. They are going to like it very much, ”said the journalist convinced, who managed to put a smile on the faces of the spectators, which most kept until he returned home.
If you never had the opportunity to try the cuisine of El Bulli, whose beginnings this story is inspired by, you may salivate over many of the dishes, but do not expect to find a faithful adaptation of the operation of that place in Cala Montjoi from which it was led a gastronomic revolution.
If you were there one day, you will recognize the essence of a creative world into which the director had already immersed himself in El Bulli, the story of a dream, just as he had also immersed himself in Dalí’s universe when he directed the documentary Salvador Dalí. In search of immortality. You will see in this kind comedy how the love between some of the characters emerges, but also the love of cooking, the love of art, the rebellion of the hippie movement and that dose of madness without which it would be impossible for genius to explode.
We already know that one of El Bulli’s main priorities was the defense of creative freedom, without corsets and breaking the mold; that he changed the rules of the game and turned kitchens upside down, dismantling established prejudices and norms. And that desire for freedom also accompanies the actors from the beginning of the plot, located at the end of the Franco regime and with the grays stepping on their heels and touching their noses.
We see Fernando (as Ferran Adrià was called at home) played by Iván Massagué, who takes refuge in El Surreal, a restaurant in Cap de Creus where Dalí is venerated and whose visit they dream of, to get his brother Alberto away from the police disturbances.
And there is Adrià’s creative look, that way of observing the world of artists and that communion of both geniuses in another dimension, that of art. The director pays a beautiful tribute to that spirit of freedom and that visionary capacity of geniuses. And there we also refer to another madman who made that revolution possible: Juli Soler.
The character of Jules, played by José García, may seem far removed from the Soler that many of those who attended the screening knew yesterday. Physically, the resemblance is non-existent, but there little by little winks appear, such as the madness for the Rolling Stones, the sense of humor, the musical, gastronomic and artistic culture. And above all, passion and the ability to be moved and empathize. Without the generosity and courage of that visionary that he entrusted to the Adrià, El Bulli would not have become what he was. Without the desire to have fun and be happy, without a disruptive and hooligan spirit, what happened would not have happened either.
