A minor masterpiece from Spain, which country has not yielded many, major or minor. On one level, it has to do with the psychological devastation that follows from an impressionable little girl's viewing of the original 1931 Frankenstein. On another level, it has to do with the wider-scale psychological devastation that followed from Franco's ascent to power (Franco-stein?). The latter subject is not dealt with so openly that the movie might have been nabbed by the Spanish censors; but the other subject is absorbing enough on its own. Ana Torrent as the traumatized child — an ingrained rainy-day sadness on her face, moist shining eyes, a hook-lipped, turtle-like mouth that suggests an upside-down pout — is one of the most hauntingly unforgettable children ever seen on screen. But her role is only a half. Her screen sister, Isabel Telleria, is her perfect and necessary complement. For every story-swallower, after all, there must be a story-spinner, and where Ana is the ideal audience, the believer, the dupe, Isabel is the conniving artist, the deceiver, the manipulator. No movie has gone harder at the purely aesthetic, amoral aspect of childhood. And with its thrillingly atmospheric photography by Luis Cuadrado (the dark and yellowy interiors often suggestive of Zurbarán, Caravaggio, Ribera), it creates a child's sense of the liveliness and voluptuousness of even the most barren environment. Its finicking aestheticism, make no mistake, is not mere ornamentalism, but is straight to the point. Directed by Victor Erice. (1973) — Duncan Shepherd
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