April’s Daughter review: Michel Franco focuses on family for his new effort which debuts in the Un Certain regard category at the 2017 Cannes Festival.
April’s Daughter review by Paul Heath at the Festival de Cannes 2017.
April’s Daughter review
Michel Franco directs this simple drama from Mexico, executive produced by British actor Tim Roth, a film basic in set-up but wonderfully staged, focusing its story around family relations, heartache and betrayal.
We open to sounds of a couple ‘enjoying relations’ while young singleton Carla (Joanna Larequi) stands in a nearby kitchen preparing a meal seemingly oblivious, or very much used to the very audible sounds coming from next door. Soon afterwards a young girl, 17-year-old Valeria (Ana Valeria Becerrilo) emerges, entering the living area so obviously pregnant, shortly followed by her curly-haired lover Mateo (Enrique Arrizon), father to the unborn child. The two are still very much in love, but are obviously starting to feel the pressure of the impending arrival, stifled by rising hospital bills and worry of becoming responsible for another life. Valeria lives with her sister, the aforementioned Carla, and doesn’t speak to her mother or father, who are divorced with the latter settling down with a new partner 35+ years his junior.
Valeria decides to call her mother Abril, the enigmatic Emma Suarez, last seen in Almodovar’s Julieta, who still hasn’t been informed of her young daughter’s condition. The film skips along, the pair reunited and the child eventually born. Valeria’s bonding with her new baby isn’t immediate, while Mateo’s father, owner of a local hotel, wants nothing to do with the new addition to the family, and forces him to move from the family home.
April’s Daughter review
Franco’s film shoots off into various directions, some very unexpected. Perfectly framing every shot and choosing to not to use any kind of music throughout, the talented writer and director has crafted a very well-bundled motion picture, perfectly capturing family dilemma, heartache and pain, all originating from the young lovers’ intense lust for one another.
The film moves at a reasonable pace, save for a lulling middle section, a lot of the success of the film down to the wonderful central performance by Suarez – the best thing about Almodovar’s 2016 Cannes entry, and easily the best thing about this too. She perfectly executes the character of April, one who is full of contradictions – both loving and heartless, helpful but overbearing, caring and conniving. She’s an absolute joy to watch, as are the two younger actors as they bring Franco’s well-written pages to life.
The narrative is perfectly wrapped with a neat a tidy ending which is as tense as you’d expect looking back at the elements of the story that lead up to it. Some may question the decisions that the young Valeria makes in the final act, especially following her apparent maturity in dealing with the completely baffling moves from her mother, but the climax is both expected and accepted as deception seems to be very much hereditary in Franco’s cinematic world.
Very different to his previous work, though full of Franco’s film-making traits, April’s Daughter is a well-formed, and near perfectly told full of excellent performances from all concerned. Seek it out.
April’s Daughter review by Paul Heath, May 2017.
April’s Daughter premieres at the Cannes Film Festival on May 20th, 2017. It will be released at a future date TBC.
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