Fading Memories (1999)
Director: Enrique Gabriel
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
After 20 years of exile in Argentina, journalist/poet Manuel (Luppi) returns to Spain to find his small town, Higueras, packing up in preparation for the flooding of the valley for a new reservoir. The difficult emotional and financial stocktaking undertaken by the town's inhabitants intensifies his own - not least in regard to his relationships with his dead brother's wife (an old flame), and idiosyncratic town elder Don José (Alterio). The film works familiar material to self-conscious effect. The excellent performances are undermined somewhat by over-emphatic and sometimes clumsy direction, with elements of farce or tragedy concerning minor characters reduced to histrionics. Undoubtedly a sincere lament for the abrogative effect on relationships and notions of belonging by change and the passage of time, but the poetry is missing and the emotions are stifled.Author: WH
Cast & crew
Director: Enrique Gabriel
Producer: Tomás Cimadevilla, Enrique González Macho
Cast: Federico Luppi, Mercedes Samprietro, Elena Anaya, Héctor Alterio, Asunción Balaguer, Mariví Bilbao, Armando Del Rio, Sergi Calleja full cast
Duration: 95 mins
Most popular on this site
Features
To the letter
Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.
Mind over matter
David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.
Fool's gold
Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.
We are the championed
Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."
A history of violence
Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.
True romantic
James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.
Playing in the dark
MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.
Junk bonds
Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.



What do you think?
Post your review now