A film by Ana Cristina Barragán
With: Simone Bucio, Francis Eddú Llumiquinga
Azucena, a woman in her thirties, approaches Julio, a teenage boy living in a group home, for reasons he doesn’t understand. As they spend time together, an uneasy closeness grows, changing the shape of a bond neither expected to find.
Our rate: *
A formal style quite similar to what we have seen in South American arthouse cinema, which plays on a relatively raw atmosphere to question and sensitize the viewer, in line with Reygadas’ early films, for example. The film opens with a scene that sets the scene: two young boys on leashes engage in a fierce fight in front of their entourage, mimicking a battle between vicious dogs. This radical symbolism then gives way to the development of a long silent, even mysterious story, set in a harsh reality. This harshness corroborates the intimate subject matter itself, and the viewer is invited to guess for themselves the conflicting feelings shared by the mother and her son, with the film playing on opacity and even confusion.