- Directed by F. Javier Gutierrez
- Written by F. Javier Gutierrez
- Stars Victor Clavijo, Ruth Diaz, Moises Ruiz
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 42 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KR_H9k6_Gg
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
It’s a dry, hot, and sweaty movie set in an arid part of Spain. Things start out okay for the hero and make a decline to terrible, but we wonder if it’s entirely his choices or outside factors. It’s a slow burn that progresses steadily enough to be engrossing with a good wrap up.
Spoilery Synopsis
Don Francisco talks to Eladio about raising his family in the mountains. Francisco says he’ll allow Eladio’ and his family to live on the estate out in the country. Credits roll.
Three years later, Eladio teaches his son how to shoot a gun on the estate, which Eladio manages. Eladio’s wife, Marcia, doesn’t like her son, Floren, learning to shoot, but she has to go along with it. Very soon after, Floren brings home a big buck.
Eladio goes to town, and Don Carlos says he’s sold thirteen stands for hunting, but Eladio says that’s not safe; bullets will be flying everywhere. Don Francisco would never approve of that, but there’s money involved, and Eladio needs more. The family is very poor, and they argue over missing shirts. Marcia hears about what Don Carlos wants, and she wants the money, urging Eladio to do the illegal hunting operation. She calls him a coward.
The hunters arrive, and there are a lot of them; Eladio has allowed more than he was supposed to, and Don Carlos pays him the promised bribe. Flores goes with them to count how many bucks get shot. The first thing that gets shot that day is Flores.
Back at home, Marcia counts her money. Both she and Eladio wonder why the truck is driving back to them in such a hurry. They’ve brought Floren’s body home, and Eladio knows that this is all his fault.
Eladio starts drinking; he had formerly given it up, but no more. Marcia says “God is punishing us.” The next morning, Eladio sees that the clothesline is missing, and so is Marcia. He and his friend Saulo, along with many others, search for her all day. They eventually find her, half-eaten by wild boars.
Eladio goes to the bar, where he hears that Don Carlos will be in town all week, hunting. That night, Eladio visit the old man and hits him in the head with a rock. He takes the old man home to bury him, but Carlos gets out of the car and runs away. The old man grabs Eladio’s gun and shoots him– with salt pellets. Carlos doesn’t get a second chance.
As Eladio digs a hole for the old man, he hits something, a box with a big padlock. In the morning, he shoots open the lock. Inside, he finds a mummified deer skull and box with a tooth inside. Saulo comes over for a beer and says Eladio needs to leave this place, as it has too many memories. He’s also brought a letter from Don Francisco, who knows about the secret arrangement and is evicting him.
Eladio drives his car into the lake to kill himself, but that doesn’t do the job. He does find some of Don Carlos’s papers, and they al have th enumber thirteen on them; he can’t read, but he knows his numbers. The police come around, looking for Don Carlos, and they notice the dog has gone missing. The dog has gone rabid and chases him into a cage where he cuts his hand on barbed wire. When he does get out, he loses his wedding ring down the drain. When he digs in the drain, he finds a snake– it’s just a bad day.
Eladio climbs down into the septic tank to find the ring, but that only makes things worse. He doesn’t get the ring back, but he does find a bif wadded up ball of barbed wire wrapped around something. He clips the wire open carefully, and inside it is a boar’s heart, along with the clothes that went missing earlier– one item from him, Marcia, and Floren.
Later, Eladio makes some soup and he finds Marcia’s foot in the pot. Then he grows fangs and turns into a wild boar. Nope–just a dream. In the morning, he grabs his shot gun and leans into it; he sees zombie Marcia, who calls him a coward again. He;s just about to do it when he sees the papers from Don Francisco; his signature matches the one on Don Carlos’s paper. Thirteen stands were legal and approved all along, and everyone knew it but him.
Eladio rides to Francisco’s house and finds all sorts of weird things inside. The place is covered in dust. He also finds pictures of families with sons dated every three years or so. All these families look just like his, and none of them lasted.
Eladio goes to town, to the bar again, and he confronts Don Francisco, who is there along with the rest of the town. “I didn’t expect you to make it this far. None of them did. They took their own lives. All of them. We’re not allowed to intervene, just wait.” The whole thing with thirteen stands was all a setup for tempting Eladio. This is all something that the land demands, every three years, and the whole town is in on it.
As the smug old man smokes, Eladio’s arms fold up like his coveralls at home. In the crowd, he sees his wife and son.
Brian’s Commentary
We learned that Spain is a sweaty place where it never rains.
It’s a slow tale of a man who makes one bad decision and pays for it over and over again. The wild boar transformation scene is good, but it’s just a dream. It’s well acted, and the sets are great, but it’s very slow moving with no explanation until the very end.
There are hints throughout that Eladio is cursed somehow, but it’s never really spelled out until the end, and even then, we don’t get a lot of details. It might all tie in with some bit of Spanish mythology that I’m not familiar with, but the magic here doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.
Still, it was a really good exploration of madness brought on by guilt over one bad decision and how it all spirals out of his control. It was slow, but good!
Kevin’s Commentary
I liked this one quite a bit. It moves slowly but steadily, building one thing on top of another. Bad choices and guilt combine with dark magic to pile on a guy who can’t get a break. The acting seemed very natural from everyone, making for an engrossing film.