Sunday's Illness

Anabel lives in a wealthy house. Her husband is a known figure and there is a reception at the house. One of the waiting staff is watching her. Then they talk. Chiara is her daughter; Anabel left her thirty five years ago. The young woman wants one thing: ten days. They will spend them together and she will decide where they go. Anabel agrees. They go to an old house in the mountains. No electricity, no neighbours, and nothing to talk about. Chiara has a reason and does not say it at once. Ramón Salazar writes and directs. Susi Sánchez plays Anabel and Bárbara Lennie plays Chiara; Miguel Ángel Solá and Greta Fernández are in the cast. It is a Spanish production. The film screened at the Málaga Film Festival and went into wide distribution afterwards. The matter it treats is whether forgiveness is possible; the film offers no easy reconciliation. The narrative rests on two performances and the setting is almost entirely enclosed. The photography is cold; the mountain and the house work as pressure inside the narrative. The narrative does not explain the past in detail and does not reduce the abandonment to a single sentence. The last section turns around a request, and that request changes the whole narrative. The narrative does not slide into melodrama and builds the feeling by saying little. Its limit is pace; the narrative is very slow, the dialogue sparse, and the ending heavy. Who it is for: viewers who like Spanish drama and narratives built on two people. Who it is not for: it is slow, cold, and the ending bitter.