''Utopia'' () is a 2003 Spanish-French fantasy thriller film film directed by

María Ripoll Maria Ripoll Julià (born 1963) is a Spanish film director from Barcelona, with an international background and eight feature films to her credit. The success of her film '' It's Now or Never'' placed her as the highest-grossing Spanish female fi ...

from a screenplay by Juan Vicente Pozuelo and Curro Royo which stars

Leonardo Sbaraglia Leonardo Máximo Sbaraglia (; born 30 June 1970) is an Argentine actor, with extensive credits in both Argentina and Spain. He has also worked in Mexico, and was cast in his first English-language role in '' Red Lights''. Biography Sbaraglia was ...

Najwa Nimri Najwa Nimri Urrutikoetxea (; born 14 February 1972) is a Spanish actress and singer. In 1996, Nimri formed the musical duo ''Najwajean'' along with producer Carlos Jean, launching ''No Blood'', an early instance of a trip-hop album in Spain. S ...

, and

Tchéky Karyo Tchéky Karyo (; born Baruh Djaki Karyo; 4 October 1953) is a Turkish-born French actor and musician. Beginning his career as an actor on stage in classical and contemporary works, he began to work as a character actor in films in the 1980s. He h ...

Plot

Upon introduction from Jorge, a development cooperator turned guerrilla fighter (Angela), a

clairvoyant Clairvoyance (; ) is the claimed ability to acquire information that would be considered impossible to get through scientifically proven sensations, thus classified as extrasensory perception, or "sixth sense". Any person who is claimed to ...

(Adrián) and a blind former cop specialised in rescuing people from destructive cults (Hervé) come across each other through Utopía, a mysterious cult based in Madrid run by Samuel.

Cast

Production

The film is a Spanish-French co-production by Alquimia Cinema and Fidélité Productions. Shooting began in

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

on 17 June 2002. Shooting locations also included

Salamanca Salamanca () is a Municipality of Spain, municipality and city in Spain, capital of the Province of Salamanca, province of the same name, located in the autonomous community of Castile and León. It is located in the Campo Charro comarca, in the ...

. It was primarily shot in Spanish, with some French dialogue. It boasted a substantial budget of €5 million.

Release

TF1 International scooped worldwide sales rights outside France and Spain. Distributed by Hispano FoxFilm, ''Utopia'' was released theatrically in Spain on 21 March 2003.

Reception

Jonathan Holland of ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' wrote that "sci-fi, noir and romance are tossed into the genre blender with uneven results". Nuria Vidal of ''

Fotogramas ''Fotogramas'' is a Spanish digital and print film magazine which has been in circulation since 1946. It is one of the early film magazines in Spain. History Founded in Barcelona, it was first published on 15 November 1946 by Antonio Nadal-Rodó ...

'' rated the film 3 out of 5 stars, highlighting a "splendid" Emma Vilarasau as the film's best.

References