¡°A mi madre, a todos los
madres¡± is Spanish director Zambrano's closing
dedication and it's a particularly fitting one for his debut feature, a
grim but ultimately optimistic tale of an Andalusian family's internal
struggle to maintain in the face of bad, black luck. There's a hint of
Lorca in Zambrano's fractured peasant family. For a contemporary Spanish
production, Solas is light years from Almodovar's flip hipness, and
it has none of the magical realism that seems to find its way into even
the most stoic of that country's film output. Solas almost feels
like a misplaced piece of Italian neorealism -- it has the tough-love
heart of Anthony Quinn's strongman Zampano and Giulietta Masina's weary
smile. And the shabby, nameless locales occasionally recall Fellini's
gritty Rome. But only just. Ana Fernandez plays Maria, a 35-year-old who
makes her living as a maid and spends her evenings with her abusive
boyfriend Juan (Juan Fernandez) downing random shots at the corner bar.
Twin disasters strike Maria when she ends up pregnant (the loutish Juan
objects to any solutions short of abortion) and her mother (Galiana)
arrives in town from the family's tiny village with Maria's ailing father
in tow. Initially put out by the fact of her aged mother sharing her
already cramped flat, Maria dives headlong into a mixture of equal parts
self-pity and whiskey, picking fights with anyone brave enough to come
within reach of her barbed, vitriolic fury. Fernandez is excellent as the
maladjusted daughter, but the film's heart and soul is embodied in
Galina's noble, understated performance. Her mousy demeanor and molelike
frame belie the proverbial heart of fire within. She's such an unimposing
figure at first glance that she barely registers. By the time Solas
ends, however, you marvel at the subtlety Galiana has brought to the role.
Zambrano has cast her as the archetypal hard-suffering mother, battered by
both husband and life, bloodied but unbowed. It's a clich¨¦ of the first
rank, to be sure, but somehow Galiana and Zambrano make it feel fresh and
vibrant, not at all the stale and shopworn cinematic pillar the role
clearly is. There's also a standout performance by Alvarez-Novoa as an
elderly neighbor who falls under the mother's charming spell and
eventually moves to assist her blighted daughter. Zambranos' film has
garnered an impressive array of critical attention and awards (everything
from the Spanish Goyas to the People's Choice Award at the 1999 Berlin
Film Festival), and with Galiana's standout performance it's plain to see
why. Still, Solas is at its core no more arresting than any one of
the dozens of Spanish-language familial soap operas that play endlessly on
Univision. A homey melodrama, sort of I Remember Mama
by way of hard-knuckled Tennessee Williams -- or maybe Lorca -- but a
melodrama nonetheless. It's inspired in its own simple way, but there's
really nothing new here -- apart from Tote Trenas' voluptuous
cinematography -- that strikes a revelatory chord.
From www.austinchronicle.com
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