Review of Smoking Room

This movie has several interesting sides. Recorded in digital video, it was produced under a low budget with good performers and was the first work of these directors with no prior experience, even in short movies (none that I have found, at least). The story presents the relationships amongst a group of workers in the Spanish headquarters of an American company. The non-smoking policy forces smokers to put up with smoking outside the facilities. This makes one of them take the initiative of lobbying for a smoking room. The campaign triggers a crisis among staff, revealing the frustrations and pathologies of working life, the envy, the relations of power and mainly the hipocresy and cinicism surrounding working life in corporate environments.

By focusing on the personalities of the different characters the film captures the essence of insolidarity belonging in competitive enivironments, the tragic lives of the underachievers and the extent to which ambition is able to run over moral values. The aparently simple subject of collecting signatures for a smoking room, becomes in this movie an epic adventure with unpredictable results. The story puts in question the working lives we lead and the ambitions that drive our western societies.

This movie was created with independent producers and has won with relevant awards. It is not only a superb film but one with a superb script and an imaginative artistical direction.