by Sarai Cervantes
The film starts with the death of Juan Maria Jauregui during the terrorist attacks at the hands of the ETA. Maria (Maria Cerezuela), Jauregui’s daughter, is given the news at a lakeside view as she spends time with her friends, making this one of the first soul-wrenching pieces in this film. In the wake of her husband’s death, Maixabel Lasa (Blanca Portillo) is asked to be a part of the Basque office for terrorism victims. Many years later, Ibon (Luis Tosar) and Luis (Urko Olazabal) Jauregui’s killers are already serving their sentence in jail; this is when the government starts a new project that is called “restorative meetings.” The program sets up encounters between the inmates and a family member that lost a loved one in one of these attacks. The purpose was to hear them out and get their side of the story after cutting ties with their terrorist group. One day, she receives an invitation to meet in person with one of her husband’s killers. Even with her immeasurable pain and her daughter’s doubts, she accepts the invitation to meet the man who took her husband away from them. The moral tone and lead of this film come directly from her principles.
The film is a Spanish drama, based on historical events that happened back in Spain in 2000. It is all about finding similarities where everyone sees differences and always finding the middle ground. Ibon and Luis find themselves extremely unhappy after spending ten years behind bars and rejecting their old beliefs and ideas, making everything harder for them in and out of prison. They soon hear about the project – Luis decides to go for it. Then an on-screen debate occurs between Esther (Tamara Canosa), the meeting moderator, and Luis, which challenges the viewer to grapple with the political and ethical issues. Maixabel and Ibon’s long-term ripple effects are essentially represented by Maria and Ibon’s mom. They are handled with sensitivity, undoubtedly balance, and skill. However, it’s the high-performance of the face-to-face encounters between Maixabel, Luis, and Ibon that build this film. Maixabel’s suffering and dignity are magnificently carried out by Portillo, while Tosar and Olazabal deliver the excellent contrast portrayals of violent men searching for redemption.
Directed by Iciar Bollain and co-written with Isa Campo, it’s the particular manner they go about setting the film for the viewer. Showing the viewer straightforward what is at stake – in a country that prefers to bury its divisions rather than debate them and where terrorism is still very much current. Maixabel commits itself to an ethical high wire walk that it pulls off exquisitely, searching for understanding, although possibly not forgiveness for the people which thousands consider to be just murderers. There is a scene in which Maixabel asks Luis, “why did you kill him?” and she is stunned to learn, just like the viewer, that he had no idea or a reason. He would simply follow orders – they would toss a coin into the air to decide who would be the one shooting – that was the end of that. If one drawback can be found, it would be in the jumps between scenes at the beginning of the film, where it goes from the killing to the kitchen and straight to the courtroom. This might have the viewer wandering around for a moment while trying to figure out what just happened. The script, the actors, and the director do a fantastic job generating all the necessary emotional power. And as Maixabel ends with a bunch of middle-aged people singing a Basque song on in front of Juan Maria Jauregui’s headstone, which most likely might not sound too thrilling for many, it will just make you shed a tear or two. It is a statement of the film’s emotional power and thoughtfulness that any viewer will find spellbinding. An added dynamic twist: at the back of the hillside, Juan Maria Jauregui’s real-life widow, Maixabel Lasa, makes an appearance as one of the singers.
MIAMI FILM FESTIVAL EXPERIENCE 