El Crack: The Peak of 'Paquismo' in Spanish Cinema

The peak of 'paquismo': what makes El Sustancia ilegal (1981) a cult film

'Paquismo' is not an official movement or academic term, but it defines a recognizable universe: the roadside bar with a terrace, cheap wine, a pinball machine, and greasy curtains. José Luis Garci's 1981 film El Sustancia ilegal has become the ultimate expression of this aesthetic, thanks to Alfredo Landa's gaze as a detective so cold he urinates ice. The film has not only gained cult status; it has become the internet's reference for 'paquismo'.

The bar sequence: the DNA of 'paquismo'

The opening is unforgettable. A bar with a dirty floor, a fat man losing at the pinball machine, red wine, and a pack of Winston cigarettes. The lemon-twisted anchovy, the foosball table, and the cassettes. All that set, with a rundown Chrysler parked in defeated Madrid, is what some precisely call 'paquismo'. It is not complacent costumbrism: it is the Spain crawling into the 1980s, which Garci portrays without condescension.

New York without permission and an express flight

One of the most commented episodes is the 15-minute final filming in New York. The production did not request permits from the City Council and filmed clandestinely for three days. The result: passersby look at the camera and opera actors. The crew forgot a lens in Madrid, and the operator had to return by plane to retrieve it, as detailed in the analysis. This cheekiness is part of the charm: the film was made with its underwear showing.

Did Tarantino copy the bar in El Sustancia ilegal?

The comparison is inevitable: the bar scene where a customer listens to the recitation of the dessert menu is almost copied in Pulp Fiction (1994). Videos comparing both have spread online, noting that in El Sustancia ilegal, José María García's program plays in the background. There was no acknowledgment from the American director, but the resemblance is so evident that it has become part of the film's legend.

Inflation and nostalgia: the economic context of 'paquismo'

'Paquismo' is also economics. In 1981 Spain, inflation was so high that restaurants, even fancy ones, wrote prices with a pen because they changed every few months. This is one of the details cited in analyses to explain the world reflected in the film: a country with a clear identity but burdened by precariousness. Some look back with nostalgia, while others point out that this nostalgia is an illusion of childhood.

Deserved cult or rehash: the battle continues

Not everyone agrees. For some, El Sustancia ilegal is a rehash of a genre exhausted 30 years prior; for others, a masterpiece of native film noir. The second part is rounder for some, while others prefer the grittiness of the first. What no one disputes is that the film has found a second life as an icon of 'paquismo', with RTVE broadcasting it free-to-air. The question of whether it deserves such cult status remains unanswered.