Official Competition

An aging billionaire hires an eccentric director and two egocentric stars to make an epic in this tremendously entertaining film starring Spanish megastars Penelope Cruz and Antonio Banderas, both a satire of and a loving homage to filmmaking (and, in its own way, perhaps a good way to kick off this year's Maine International Film Festival one week early.) "Roughly two hours of sharp reflections deliciously wrapped in entertaining antics…. Despite its commitment to biting humor and acerbic analysis, OFFICIAL COMPETITION is, at its heart, a celebration of artists and their process"—Hollywood Reporter. "Cruz is quite obviously having a ball sending up the ivory-tower vanities and mannerisms of the prodigious auteurs she's worked with over the years. It's a performance of fizzy, frenzied, physically elastic inventiveness"—Guy Lodge, Variety.

In Spanish with English subtitles.

Scheduled to start Friday, July 1