Review: Solas

The ice melts in a glass of cognac and the ashes disappear. Tears mix with the alcohol and dissolve. An ice cube sinks to the bottom, visible to someone looking in from outside. It does not dissolve or melt. It stays in the glass until someone decides to empty it. The cognac has served no purpose. Both the cube and the emptiness still remain.

It’s always the same old story. Before and after work, on waking up and just before bed, María (Ana Fernández) continually sets about filling a glass of cognac in order to try and see the world from a different perspective. Or maybe she doesn’t want to see it at all. Her father’s illness has meant she must spend time with her mother, by now almost a stranger, when she comes to visit Seville as her husband (Paco De Osca) recovers from surgery. In the film she is forced to once again become the daughter of her mother (María Gallina), a humble, selfless and staunch woman in her seventies. Resentment and old wounds emerge. Each scene is a voyage of discovery, showing the brutal reality of how they affect each other. Solas is fundamentally a depiction of shared loneliness.

In this film, director Benito Zambrano contemplates age, values that have been lost and found again, as well as elusive ideas such as happiness, loyalty and masculinity. An exposé of the culture of machismo exemplified by the abusive and tyrannical father, whose character so affected the life of both his wife and belligerent daughter. He raises questions and a clear answer: a masculine, strong or powerful man is not necessarily more of a man.

The male character that stands out amongst all the rest is the melancholic downstairs neighbour (Carlos Alvares-Novoa) depicted as lonely, weak and childlike. Instead of being an animal, he lives with one, his loyal dog Achilles. It is from him that Maria Gallina hears words she has never heard before: “In the few days I have left to live and all the hours of loneliness I have left to endure, you will be a pleasant memory for me”. “Your words touch me deep inside”, she responds.

Zambrano returned to his native Seville having completed his degree in Screenplay and Management in Cuba, and the seed was already sown for the film. The streets of Carmona and Seville were chosen for the film and the cast was composed of unknown actors. Ana Fernández, a weather girl on Canal Sur whom Zambrano met on a television-set while practicing his camera skills. María Galiana, a teacher of Art History in a Seville institute, became one of the most admirable characters to be seen on screen in the past few years. Carlos Álvarez-Novoa, from Asturias, who had already tried his hand at performance, brought life to the character who accompanies both women in this indispensable film.

The film was presented in 1999 and was awarded five Goya Prizes (Best New Director, Best Original Screenplay, Best Actress, Best Actor and Best New Actress). And it didn’t just do well on the Spanish market. It also won the Public Prize in bother the Berlin and Tokyo Festivals, as well as several awards throughout Europe and Latin America. Solas is a sober, simple and honest testament to generational change, a return to hope, and is an all-round tribute to women everywhere. A film that bleeds onto every shot and affects everyone that sees it.

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