MOVIE REVIEW: Forastera
Images courtesy of Grasshopper Film
FORASTERA— 3 STARS
Often, the challenge of expanding a short film into a full-length feature can be narrative thickness and pacing. For as much as expansion welcomes depth and patience, sometimes a snug story and its impact weaken when stretched or diluted. Filmmaker Lucía Aleñar Iglesias was granted the rewarding opportunity to remake her own well-regarded short Foreigner, and her result, Forastera, her feature-length debut, exemplifies the potential positives and negatives of that difficulty.
LESSON #1: MAKE YOUR VACATION HOME YOUR REGULAR HOME— Right off the bat, regardless of the heavy drama coming, Iglesias picked a stunning setting. Forastera takes place on the idyllic northern coast of the Spanish Balearic island of Mallorca. Young Catalina (Zoe Stein of Sophia’s Sophistication) is vacationing in this paradise at the home of her cherished grandparents, Tomeu (Almodóvar vet Lluís Homar of Broken Embraces and Bad Education), and her namesake, Catalina (Marta Angelat of the long-running TV series With That Same Look). Residing on the rocky coastline and near the beautiful, sheltered seas of the Badia de Pollença near the township of Alcúdia, the seniors are living the maxim of making one’s vacation home their regular home.
For the teenage Cata, spending this time in Alcúdia is as much about basking in relaxation and social interaction as it is quality time with family. That comfort is shattered when she arrives home from a nice day at the beach, complete with courting a young Swedish fellow (newcomer Nonni Ardal Hammarström), to the body of her grandmother lying motionless by the entrance of her home. She’s declared dead from injuries sustained from an apparent accidental fall.
LESSON #2: DIFFERENT CONCENTRATIONS AND EXPRESSIONS OF GRIEF— This death could not have been more unexpected and tragic to the family. The elder Catalina was the unifying presence of the family. Tomeu is completely crushed, weeping strongly and unable to process the logistics. His daughter and Cata’s mother, Pepa (Núria Prims of Tea for Two and Uncertain Glory), does her best to be the responsible one, making arrangements and keeping people on track. Meanwhile, Cata and, to a lesser degree, her younger sister, are in the malaise of missing their loved one while voyeuristically watching and listening to their adults juggle heavier duties. Across the ensemble, Forastera fleshes out these different stages of mourning.
Arguments about composure and purposes between Pepa and Tomeu that are supposed to be private sidebars in Forastera are audible to the girls gathered with earshot in the home’s thin walls. The young ladies hear the truths their elders think they aren’t ready to understand, when that’s most often not the case. These haphazard emotional boundaries add to the encompassing grief. Not everyone is acknowledged or heard, and it shows.
Cata, in particular, hasn’t shed a tear and occasionally wonders why that part of her heart is closed. As the days since Catalina’s death grow, Pepa begins to go through her mother’s belongings. She and her daughters take a curious interest in their grandmother’s various dresses from decades long passed. One dress—a collared, short-sleeved number, dotted with a matrix of red-and-black blends—fits Cata like a glove.
LESSON #3: THE IMAGINATION OF PLAYING DRESS UP— The act of trying on clothes, whether they are new ones in a store or something used or belonging to someone else, stirs instant emotions. A sense of maturity can swell with any outfit. Confidence and self-efficacy can soar, and empowerment percolates. For Cata, these instances of “playing dress-up” bring her closer to her lost grandma on an ethereal level. It’s a guise of continued bonding. She receives those jolts of sureness, breaking the grim mood of the household and enabling a little imagination in Tomeu.
In observing this rippling wake after loss, Forastera shades that sense of spirit with a hint of the supernatural. Tomeu is convinced his deceased love is everywhere in their house, much to Pepa’s pragmatic chagrin. Through intimate framing from cinematographer Agnès Piqué Corbera (The Permanent Picture) and shivering swells of strings from composers Filip Leyman and Anna Von Hausswolff (The Most Beautiful Boy in the World and the upcoming Angelina Jolie vehicle Couture), Catalina could even be in those dresses, semi-possessing her granddaughter of the same name.
Once that suggestion becomes steeped in Forastera, the film grows to become a different drama entirely. Much like the recent Magic Hour, which dabbled more overtly in this spectral department, viewers of Iglesias’s film may or may not immediately subscribe to the notion of spirits and ghosts among us, which will strengthen or fray their connection with the story, depending on where they fall. There’s not so much a need for someone to take the matriarch’s place, but more of finding someone to match her presence. Some of that is a woman’s touch around the place, and some of that is zeal, creativity, and empathy imparted to the vibrant world outside its well. This shift creates the unifying draw of Zoe Stein’s poise-positive lead performance as a young woman respecting the gravity of what has occurred with self-reflection that is never petulant.
LOGO DESIGNED BY MEENTS ILLUSTRATED (#1396)
