In an isolated fishing village, everyone knows everyone else's business but not always their own. Laia is a neglected and unloved child, tormented for her epilepsy and strange ways, but grows up tough, wilful and beautiful. Two marriages revive hatred and resentment stewing over many years as Laia unleashes a torrent of strong feelings and anger.
A measured film with a washed-out colour palette that often seems fully monochrome. We sense time passing slowly, repetitively, as the menfolk fish when the sea allows and the women wait to marry or to inherit and then marry. An odd, slightly awkward, skeleton and drum dance punctuates the runtime, perhaps to mark the passing of seasons, although they bleed into the main plot at one point.
The actor playing Laia captures the wayward spirit and self-destructive behaviour that often follows a neglectful childhood, although there seems to be an odd disconnect between childhood and adulthood, as if the characters ceased to know each other before becoming reacquainted. Laia seems to outgrow childhood epilepsy, leaving a single seizure as an inadequate explanation for her curious mix of integration and aloofness.
Some other characters are more caricatures. The wise priest, the knowing bar keeper, the likeable philanderer. The hook-nosed hunchbacked heiress would be a lazy stereotype if only she had a hook-nose or a hunchback.
The overall feeling is of impending tragedy, but the film keeps us enthralled until we learn just how inevitable it had been. Beautifully shot, with horizontal lines emphasising the openness of the sea and the isolation of the village. As far from a romcom as it is possible to get, but compelling all the same.
