The director and screenwriter with the most Goya awards, premieres in Spain the adaptation of the autobiographical novel “Tre ciotole” by Italian writer Michela Murgia, starring Alba Rohrwacher, Elio Germano and Francesco Carril
Isabel Coixet returns to the Valladolid International Film Festival (SEMINCI) to open the festival with her last film, Three Goodbyes, on 24 October after the opening gala at the Calderón Theatre. The film will compete for the Golden Spike in the Official Section of the 70th edition of the competition.
A love story in reverse
Three Goodbyes adapts three stories from the posthumous and semi-autobiographical book Three Bowls (Tre ciotole) by Michela Murgia, a feminist activist and one of Italy’s most influential intellectuals who died in 2023. Since achieving success in 2009 with The Finisher (Accabadora), a novel about women who help terminally ill patients die in her native Sardinia, Murgia became an influential intellectual through her newspaper articles, essays such as And the Church Invented Woman (E la chiesa inventó la donna), plays and even her political commitment to Sardinian nationalism.
Three Goodbyes recounts what happens after Marta and Antonio separate. He, a promising chef, takes refuge in his kitchen; she begins to feel more than just sadness: she has lost her appetite… and not just because of heartbreak. When she discovers that there is a health problem behind it, everything takes an unexpected turn: food tastes better, music touches her like never before, and desire awakens her desire to live without fear.
‘It’s a love story told backwards,’ explains Coixet about this portrait of someone who learns what it means to be alive when faced with death. The film, shot on the streets of Rome, marks the director’s return after the success of Un amor (2023), an adaptation of the novel of the same title by Sara Mesa.
Alba Rohrwacher (The Chimera, The Solitude of Prime Numbers and My Brilliant Friend), winner of the Volpi Cup for Best Actress at the Venice Film Festival for Hungry Hearts, plays the lead role, accompanied by Elio Germano (Best Actor Award at Cannes for La nostra vita and Silver Bear at the Berlinale for Hidden Away), who plays Antonio, her partner.
The cast is completed by Spanish actor Francesco Carril (The New Years, by Rodrigo Sorogoyen, and The Reconquestand The Wishful Thinkers, by Jonás Trueba), Silvia D’Amico, Galatea Bellugi and Sarita Choudhury, who returns to work with Coixet after It Snows in Benidorm.
Opens Seminci for third time
The filmmaker, awarded the Spike of Honour in 2020, has maintained a close relationship with SEMINCI since 2014. In previous editions, she has already opened the festival with The Bookshop (2017) and It Snows in Benidorm (2020), as well as closing the 60th edition with Nobody Wants the Night in 2015.
The director of films such as My Life Without Me, Things I Never Told You and The Secret Life of Words has received the National Film Award, the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres Medal from the French Ministry of Culture and the European Achievement in World Cinema Award.
The film, co-written by the director and screenwriter Enrico Audenino, is a Spanish-Italian co-production by Cattleya (part of ITV Studios), Ruvido Produzioni, Bartlebyfilm, Buenapinta Media, Bteam Prods, Perdición Films, Apaches Entertainment and Tres Cuencos AIE. It has the support of the Italian Ministry of Culture (MIC–DGCA) and the participation of Sky, RTVE and MAX. Distributed in Spain by Bteam Pictures, the film is scheduled for release in Spanish cinemas in 2026.