Consulate of Venezuela in Barcelona accompanies the preview of “Cosas de Casa” in Madrid

Published at: 06/10/2026 03:36 PM

The Consulate General of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in Barcelona accompanied the preview of Cosas de Casa, the new feature film by Venezuelan filmmaker, screenwriter and writer John Petrizzelli, which took place on Friday, October 2 at the Sala SGAE (General Society of Authors of Spain) in Madrid.

Organized by Triangle Studio, the meeting allowed the film to be presented before its arrival in Venezuelan theaters, scheduled for November 12, and brought together around Cosas de Casa its director, representatives of the cinematographic field and the public interested in Venezuelan audiovisual creation . The event was moderated by journalist Linda D'Ambrosio and, after the screening, a cine-forum was held.

The meeting in Madrid was attended, among others, by the Venezuelan Consul General in Barcelona, Carlos Azpúrua, who, during his tenure as president of the National Autonomous Center for Cinematography (CNAC), promoted the Learning by Doing program, within the framework of which Things from Home was developed. The initiative, launched in 2022, linked low-budget film production with the practical training of new professionals, bringing students and new talent into feature films, together with experienced directors and technicians.

“Low-budget cinema is not a minor cinema or a second-rate cinema , but a real possibility of creation, experimentation and, above all, the training of new filmmakers. It's about creating the conditions to make films from below, with few resources, but with talent, commitment and freedom, and at the same time opening up opportunities for those who are going to build the Venezuelan cinema of the future. That future cannot depend solely on how much money is available, but on our capacity to produce, train and give a voice to those who have something to tell,” Azpúrua points out.

A commitment that Petrizzelli also claims: “Learning by Doing has enemies and detractors, especially among those who defend a strictly commercial, Hollywood-style cinema model, or dependent on large budgets. But I think it's a very valuable initiative and I congratulate its creator, Carlos Azpúrua, because without this program I couldn't have finished the film.”

Cosas de Casa is a dramatic work that is part of a trajectory of more than four decades, in which John Petrizzelli explores, from fiction and documentary, memory and popular culture, with special attention to those lives and experiences that rarely occupy the center of stories.

Shot in abandoned houses in Caracas, the film turns ruins into territories of memory where the ghosts of former cooks, maids, drivers and gardeners return to tell intimate, strange and tragic episodes of their lives, in the face of versions of their bosses.

Interpreted by professional actors and people truly linked to domestic work, Cosas de Casa thus constructs a choral narrative in which different memories face and complement each other, while stories of love, desire, violence, solidarity and humiliation emerge, and the class, gender, race and power relationships that went through that society.

Between magical realism, poetry and surrealism, the more the old mansions deteriorate, the more present the stories of those who inhabited them become. There is beauty and anger, tenderness and cruelty, and a nostalgia that also questions that world that disappeared and wonders what was unsustainable in its foundations.

“I would like the spectator to take away some of that poetry, those stories and those affections, but also a certain discomfort, even a certain anger, in the face of realities that as a society we have not been able to avoid: social relations crossed by profound inequalities that, of course, are not exclusive to Venezuela,” explains the filmmaker.

Cosas de Casa began to take shape around 2010, when it still held the title of Doméstic @s, based on the director's memories and the stories he heard over the years from the domestic workers who were part of his environment.

The feature film included the participation of CNAC through the Learning by Doing program, with the addition of students from the National Experimental University of the Arts (UNEARTE). The production also brings together Triangle Estudio, Menda C. and Villa del Cine, as a result of the work of a large artistic, technical and human team.

John Petrizzelli has written and directed several feature films and short films, and is the creator and director of the Diversity Film Series, which has been held in Venezuela since 2006.

MPPRE