Bad times to get bored of the lists. Someone said that we list everything there is to do or see to become aware of what we will leave undone. Be that as it may, what we propose now is a brief approximation to what we are experiencing, but from a perhaps slightly optimistic point of view. They are ten comedies (and even some musical, or almost) about confinement in any of its forms and modes. All of them, yes, accessible from some platform at hand.

1. The factory of nothing, by Pedro Pinho (2017)

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We start with the most unclassifiable. The story of some workers forced by the crisis to do nothing necessarily reminds us of our history. About to be fired, the factory owner leaves them without machinery and with nothing to do but wait confined inside the factory. Half satire, the other half comedy, but without giving up the bitter taste of our most intimate tragedy, the Portuguese Pedro Pinho manages to compose an elegant and musical (yes, it is sung and danced) recusal to these times of crisis, post-crisis or antecrisis. But that, with being a lot, hardly anything. Suddenly, everything is turned upside down. What is discussed are both the rules of each film genre and those of society itself not so much of consumption as simply consumed. Without fear of being wrong, we are in front of some of the freest, most acidic, fun, critical and memorable works in a long time. A cinema for nothing; a cinema for everything. In Filmin

2. The Party by Sally Potter (2017)

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At the time, the director of ' Orlando ' commented that her idea when writing this camera piece locked in an apartment was to denounce the political situation in her country and in Europe as a whole. What matters to him, he added, is not so much what is said as what is shown: the environment of strange corruption (of morals and of the other) in which everything happens. On the screen, the story is limited to what the title says. A group of friends gather to celebrate the appointment of minister to the character who gives life to Kristin Scott Thomas. And as you know, nothing like a meeting of colleagues to tear off your skin. As never before, Potter shoots everything: feminism, motherhood, loyalty ... Everything is liable to explode. And indeed it does. Agile, shameless and voracious. No one or nothing is left standing. In Filmin

3. Barton Fink, from the Coen brothers (1991)

Few such accurate ways to peer into claustrophobia, blockage, and indeed confinement as with one of the Coen brothers' greatest works. The former Palme d'Or at Cannes in 1993 tells the story of a successful playwright (John Turturro by the name of the film) turned Hollywood screenwriter. Your mission: complete the script for a wrestling movie. His work plan: none. Locked up in a hotel, what follows is a delusional journey to the bottom of bottomless things. That, in addition to a brilliant and distressing, all at the same time, reflection on cinema, creation and, once again, that great confinement that is life. But without losing the smile, of course. He laughs at everything that hurts. In Filmin

4. The Purple Rose of Cairo, by Woody Allen (1985)

Just published his most disastrous work (his unfortunate autobiography), which less than compensate and pay homage to which could well go through his best film. Or almost. Here, the entire universe in full depression of the 30s lives its moment of glory in the confinement of a movie theater. The Brooklyn director plays around the mirror and the dark room (fiction) suddenly becomes the only place of release possible. He tells in his memoirs that he spent years going over the idea of ​​the character (Jeff Daniels) who escapes from a movie to enter the confinement of reality and that he only saw the movie when he imagined the improbable encounter between the actor and that character on the run. Something much more than just brilliant. In Filmin

5. Lost in Translation, by Sofia Coppola (2003)

Can you only be in the middle of the most populous city with the most attractions in the world? Do me a favor and keep the answer a secret. There is no need to make blood. Sofia Coppola uses the best versions of Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson to complete the most beautiful, delicate, simple and emotional approach to the greatest and most evident of confinements, the confinement of being alive. It sounds very sad, but in reality it is just lucidity. And of course, who doesn't laugh at karaoke? On Netflix

6. What we do in the shadows, by Taika Waititi (2014)

Taika Wiatiti started being Taika Waititi here. This may tell you little, but it is enough, believe me. The director of 'Jojo Rabbit' imagines not so much a spatial confinement as an existential one. If it is bad to live in a world by definition strange and haunted by viruses, it is even more so if you are not even a being of this world. Do immortal vampires sneeze? All this not to mention the claustrophobia caused by coffins. The life of three distant cousins ​​of Count Dracula guides one of the most heterodox comedies ever laughed and turned into a cult since it appeared in 2014. Then there was a series and, although it is not the same, there is also no way to resist. On HBO

7. My big night, Álex de la Iglesia (2015)

Although the result does not excite us because of its tendency to pile up chaos upon chaos from its director, the truth is that 'My big night' enjoys some of the most memorably fun and catastrophic moments in confined cinema. For those of us who are fond of suffering on New Year's Eve with those abhorrent programs in which people laugh because they have nothing better to do, the idea of ​​posing an entire film in advance recording of a special new year cannot seem more inalienable to us. Suddenly, everything is a metaphor for everything in life seen as a tragedy for clowns sick with their own humor. It sounds tremendous and it is. In Flixolé

8. Honey, I've Shrunk the Kids, by Joe Johnston (1989)

Not long ago, Disney reported that because of the coronavirus the filming of a 'remake' of this foolish classic from the 80s was interrupted. Not everything about the virus was going to be bad. Rick Moranis was in 'Ghostbusters ' and he's here. I think there are plenty of reasons to assume that heaven has earned it. As you will remember, the garden suddenly turns into a jungle for those adorable diminished kids. I know what they are thinking. Yes, something like this would make us want right now. At Disney +

9. The Simpsons, the movie, by David Silverman (2007)

The start makes it clear that we are where we always were. Homer must save Springfield (that is, the world) from a catastrophe caused by him. The rest is a pig; no, better, a spider pig . In reality, the film differs little (if at all) from any of the indefatigable chapters that make up the Matt Groening prodigy that best defines us. To all. And why is it on this list? Answer: by the dome; a giant dome isolates Springfield from the world. If even Homer came out of a confinement, it must be wrong for us. At Disney + .

10. The Exterminating Angel, by Luis Buñuel (1962)

And finally, the ' sancta sanctorum' of all the stories of confinement. Dinner at the mansion of the Nóbile seems the only possible approach to the meaning (read nonsense) of the world. Terrible, awesome, subversive, rounded, hypnotic and, worst of all, hideously funny. It was the Beckett characters from 'Endgame' , buried in the trash, who said that nothing is more fun than misery. Well that. Comedy is, although it is difficult to get used to the idea. In Flixolé .

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