16/17
It follows young Emma on her journey to learn how to communicate with the spirit of a girl, Uxoa, who has been trapped in a hermitage for centuries, so she tries to convince Carol, a skeptical medium, to help her.. A tense, terrifying, melancholic, suffocating fantasy thriller with hints of a ghost story. The supernatural thriller is full of scary, hard facts, chills and plenty of scares; however, some are confusing and inexplicable, the reason for some creepy events are never well explained. The film depicts a fictional story of the social reality affecting a small town. It opens with an apparent historical prologue involving the plague, a chapel that housed the sick, and a regiment of beaked birdmen, but this turns out to be a recreation of the pageant, as part of a small town’s annual festival, when the chapel believed to be haunted by little Usoa is opened for a brief spell. It follows young Emma (Maia Zaitegi) on her journey to learn how to communicate with the spirit of a girl, Uxoa, who has been trapped in a hermitage for centuries, so she tries to convince Carol (Belén Rueda), a skeptic and fake medium, but help her. The latter has literal scars from a childhood when her mother, perhaps real, seemed more interested in a local little girl ghost than her own daughter. This is an acceptable, acceptable film, with a lot of not always sympathetic, deeply human, and relatable protagonists. . This is a haunted film that contains agitated horror and a sinister atmosphere when the menacing beings appear. A tense, mysterious film, full of thrills, suspense, chills, red herrings, creepy twists. The mystery gradually begins to unravel until its surprising end, resulting in a sentimental ghost story, with serious, disturbing nuances, in the manner of ¨Orphanage¨ or ̈Pan’s Labyrinth¨, but with its own distinctive feminine accent. It is an attractive drama whose interest decreases as the actual excess of its tiresome accumulation of supposedly terrifying elements increases. While ̈Cerdita ̈ focuses on pure terror in ̈La Ermita ̈, there are several things that confirm Pereda as a key figure in the current horror and fantasy genre. One is his frontal entry into genre cinema: she bets on fantasy without hesitation, adding a personal drama. It deflates as the filming continues and prevents us from talking about a gem like ‘Cerdita’. However, Pereda manages to make a film that is more than worthy, but inferior to the previous one. Pearl has a great eye for the gothic, relishing the trappings of Spanish horror without really making a horror film. Turns out to be an adequate and decent movie, but not remarkable. Belén Rueda stars giving a nice acting in her usual style, she is an expert actress in mystery and horror films such as: Julia’s eyes, The orphanage, You will not sleep, During the storm, The Pact, Orbita 9 and The Body. In fact, Belén Rueda is the closest thing Spain has to a horror heroine, or a “Scream Queen”, she fits in well with the child prodigy Maia Zaitegi who evokes the young Ana Torrent in Cria Cuervos or El espiritu de la colmena (The Spirit of the Hive). The film was professionally directed by Carlota Pereda, who is clearly a talented writer and filmmaker. As a female drama with similar genre tones, it is the second solid showcase for Pereda’s talent. It won 2023: Sitges Film Festival: Official Feature Film Section (out of competition) and 2023: Goya Awards (Spain): nominated for Best Special Effects. Carlota Pereda herself, winner of the Goya Award for best short film in 2018 and also starring Laura Galán. Rating: 5.5/10.