ROMANTIC DRAMA; 1hr 49min (Spanish with subtitles)
STARRING: Paulina García, Sergio Hernández
Aiming high: Hernández and García
Gloria (Garcia, magnetic in her every move) is a Chilean woman of a certain age (OK, 58). She’s divorced and her two children are grown. At 58, there’s oodles of mileage on the clock — Gloria still works and is attractive in a conservative way, with a promising sparkle in her smile. Yet there’s also a sense that the messy, vital business of a life fully lived is passing her by. She seems to sense it, too and by night she (sedately) prowls, seeking companionship and maybe more.
She evidently finds it with 65-year-old Rodolfo (Hernández), an ex-navy man, now an amusement-park owner, divorced, too, with a new appetite for experience. Rodolfo is also a parent, so obviously there is mutual family baggage. In an ideal world, its weight would be eased by the level-headedness of experience. But in matters of the heart, no-one ever really grows old. Director Sebastién Lelio looks wisely and unshrinkingly at the pitfalls of second chances. They’re not so pretty in your fifth and sixth decades, especially with every bump and wrinkle exposed. But they can still hurt like hell.
