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How sad is this?

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Arguably, a masterpiece. Hung on a clichéd story of 2 teen sisters murdered, and 2 detectives look for whodunit. It plays out slowly but the texture is stunningly vivid. Superb photography, memorable acting, music that asks questions, simmering political undertones. Suffice it to say there's a helluva lot going on in this picture and the more you know about Spain the more you'll know. But how knowable is Spain? As I said, this is slow for a thriller but there is existential mystery and tension. The crime may be solved, so future murders won't happen, maybe. But is there any other consequence? The similarity to True Detective season 1 is uncanny. TD was first broadcast in January 2014; Marshland was released in Spain in September 2014. Even if the latter is just a Spanish take on TD, I can see why it swept the 2015 Goyas (Spain's Oscar equivalent). It was made with Spain blood.

This is one of those rare but fantastic thrillers where the locations and weather conditions form an equally important – if not even more important – protagonist as the leading actors/actresses. So, in fact, "La Isla Mínima" hasn't got two but three lead actors: Javier Gutiérrez, Raùl Arévalo and the mesmerizing Southern Andalusian filming location during a hot and moist summer! And there's another peculiar oddity that contributes to the unique and unsettling atmosphere of the film, namely that the events take place in the year 1980. We see quite a lot of thrillers nowadays that take place in the eighties, and usually scriptwriters do this because they want to avoid inserting new technologies like mobile phones or internet, but here it serves another and very particular purpose. The time accurately depicts a nation stuck in a vast identity crisis; Spain licking its wounds and slowly recovering from the Franco dictatorship period. Here, in a small community amidst the Andalusia marshlands, two detectives from Seville are investigating the disappearance of two teenage girls – sisters – during the annual town's carnival. The detectives are complete opposites. Pedro is young, ambitious and obeys the rules as much as possible, whereas Juan is experienced but cocky, struggling with his health and addictions and his methods to obtain information are often quite rough and unorthodox. Yes, admittedly the forced collaboration between two completely opposite police personalities is one of the biggest and most overused clichés in cinematic history, but in "La Isla Mínima" it doesn't feel derivative or annoying for even one second. Probably this is because the sober but clever script never urges you to pick a favorite or influences you to like/dislike one or the other. Both Juan and Pedro are intelligent, brave and determined police officers, albeit in their own introvert/extrovert styles. The two quickly discover that the missing (most certainly murdered) girls aren't the first victims and that there's a serial killer at large in the marshlands since a couple of years already, but then their investigation jams completely. The atmosphere and underlying suspense of "La Isla Mínima" is unfathomable! The pacing is incredibly slow, but that's perfectly fine since the Andalusian temperatures wouldn't even allow for a speedy pacing, but the tension is continuous and absorbing. This Spanish instant-classic often gets compared to the prestigious American hit-series "True Detective", which apparently is a huge compliment (I haven't seen it yet myself), but I'm confident to state that it is probably also a huge compliment for "True Detective" to get compared to "La Isla Mínima". The cinematography is often just downright phenomenal; just look at those opening sequences for instance, which are shot from a helicopter or something and make the dreamy landscapes like beautiful paintings. Make no mistake, since there are a handful of really tense sequences that bring you to the edge of your chair with suspense. What I mean to say, in fact, is that "La Isla Mínima" is a near perfect film that has almost everything.

La isla mínima (known as Marshland to the Anglophones) at the surface resembles countless other crime films and stories. Two cops with very different personalities are summoned to an unfamiliar place in order to solve a crime and in the process they uncover dark secrets that lie under the small community. What makes the difference in this film however is how the filmmakers make use of the setting. The movie takes place in Spain during the Spanish transition to democracy some years after Franco's death.The two protagonists represent the different stances and political backgrounds. Pedro is an uptight cop with democratic convictions eager for the extinction of fascism in his country who is partnered with Juan an experienced cop who in this movie acts as a representative of Franco's regime. The two of them are called to investigation two missing girls in the Spanish countryside and to put aside their political differences.As a whodunit Marshland is a gripping and suspenseful movie with fine cinematography and the central mystery even though kinda formulaic preserves the viewer's interest till the finale. But at the relationship between the two leads and how this resonates with the political landscape of the 1980's Spain is where the central core of this story resides. For example Pedro, as the investigation progresses, comes at terms with the undemocratic and violent methods of Juan and makes compromises with his beliefs in order to solve a case which will allow him to advance his career.All in all I highly recommend Marshland if you want to watch an entertaining and intelligent mystery which scathingly comments on a turbulent period of the Spanish history.

I can't remember having enjoyed a film so much. This film kept me spellbound till the very end. The climax was also well executed, as well as the final scene before the end-credits roll.Marshland also known in Spanish as La isla mínima("Minimal Island") is a 2014 Spanish thriller film directed by Alberto Rodríguez. It won ten Goya Awards, including Best Film, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay and Best Actor (Javier Gutiérrez). The plot of the film deals with the disappearance of two teenage girls during the harvest festivities. Two ideologically opposed homicide detectives from Madrid are reprimanded and sent to a forgotten town on the Guadalquivir Marshes to investigate.Detectives Juan(Javier Gutiérrez) and Pedro(Raúl Arévalo) must put aside their differences if they are to successfully hunt down a killer who for years has terrorized a community in the shadow of a general disregard for women rooted in a misogynistic past. The film is set in Spain during 1980 during the era of the Franco dictatorship. We see that the militia are still the main authority over the local police. Also there is a lot of red tape for the detectives to deal with. They have to solve the crime quickly and delicately without drawing a lot of attention from the press. The film shows the graphic nature of the aftermath of a terrible crime. We are spared nothing. We see the crime through the eyes of the detectives as well as the parents of the victims. More crimes are uncovered as the film progresses. We see also how pretty young teenage girls are trapped into prostitution by money or drugs. To a casual viewer, the film may be brutal at times, but this is how the world truly is. Even now as I type this review, a lot of crimes are taking place in the world. I hope one day, people of all nationalities can live in love and peace and that there will be an end to crime once and for all.More serial killer films: The Secret Life: Jeffrey Dahmer (1993), To Catch a Killer (1992), The Deliberate Stranger (1986), Citizen X (1995), The Gray Man (2007), Confessions of a Serial Killer (1985). Deranged: Confessions of a Necrophile (1974). All this films are based on real-life killers. Thank you for having the time to read this review. May you live long and prosper.