Villaronga’s second stint as a director-for-hire. It was the film’s star, María Barranco, who did the recruiting, even allowing him a say in the screenplay. Which shows! 99.9 might be more of a straight-shooting thrills-and-shocks, sex-and-violence genre exercise than his other classification-defying masterpieces, but it’s nevertheless very much a Villaronga film. Not to mention a mighty fun one at that. The story is loosely based on a well-documented true event, the Bélmez Faces. On August 23rd 1971, pale faces appeared in the cement floor of 5 calle Real, in the Andalusian backwater of Bélmez de la Moraleda. In this version, Lara, the hostess of a radio show dealing in the paranormal, encounters similar happenings – and worse – which seem to be connected with the strange death of her former lover Victor. Here’s a hint: turn the title’s numbers upside down…
