COMPETITION A couple who have found a house near Madrid receive another couple, friends, who have come to see their new house and spend the afternoon. The conversation is pleasant and the film touches on normal themes around the first steps into adulthood, like the things that change when new human beings arrive in the world, and the things that remain, like the companions of a lifetime. A film that begs to be seen.
In a small, light-hearted anecdote that feels as comfortable as a conversation between friends, Jonás Trueba brings us an observational game between two couples in their thirties who are trying to connect. Moving from the winter of Madrid to the summer in its surroundings, this small Rohmerian drama is established through a discreet camera where some pieces of the relationships gradually come apart amidst long intellectual conversations, walks in the countryside, and ironic humor. With remnants of the COVID-19 pandemic still haunting its characters and feelings, Trueba offers us an interesting portrait of a certain experience in the face of a melancholic sense of life’s lack of meaning. (Lucas Camargo de Barros)
