Spanish writer/director Víctor Erice, whose debut in SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE/’73 is credited with jump-starting the post-Franco cinema generation (and before Franco had even died)*, went on to a curtailed career of shorts & documentaries, finally releasing a new feature film last year with CLOSE YOUR EYES/’23 (not seen here). Yet there’s an unaccountably ignored feature made between those two, hiding in plain sight (now out on Criterion, but largely a Film Fest prisoner in its day) and it's something of a wonder. EL SUR’s lack of visibility outside of Spain is possibly caused by Erice’s displeasure at not being allowed to finish. A ‘missing’ third act was supposed to follow the title and ‘go south,’ but either the producer felt it complete as is, or (more mundanely) he simply ran of cash. It’s a chamber piece, but large in emotion and spirit, a haunting story of a 12-yr-old girl growing up in a sort of limbo, trying to puzzle out the mystery of her parents’ marriage while stuck between city & the countryside in a rambling house known locally s The Seagull. The parents warily unhappy with their lives and what remains of their goals (father a doctor, mother unemployed teacher) apparently held back by their anti-Franco sentiments. (It’s the ‘50s/’60s; Franco still in charge.) Crucially, Erice gives the young daughter POV in his construction, so this coming-of-age set-up covers the emotional breakage of others as well. Shot with the dense texture and pallette of prime Gordon Willis, the lighting as extraordinary as the interiors of the first GODFATHER film (from José Luis Alcaine, preferred D.P. for Pedro Almodóvar among other top directors), the pace contemplative, with hopes, desires & regrets muted to the point of extinction. The missing third act, not at all a problem. Maybe preferable. For once, a producer may have been right to stop before the film ‘went South.’
DOUBLE-BILL: *Erice’s SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE sounds like it couldn’t live up to its rep, but comes pretty damn close.
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