RIFLE RANGE BOY: Through the lens of a child's eyes!

El Sur (Spanish, The South; 1983)
Director: Victor Erice

This film has been hailed as one of the best films ever to come out of Spain. Ironically, the director refers to this film as an unfinished product. The remaining 90 minutes of the movie where the protagonist is supposed to visit the South of Spain never came out in the final product. Some say it was due to a lack of funds that the producer did not proceed with filming.

As children, as we were growing up, we wanted to know everything that was happening around us. We knew something not right was going on but just could not put the finger on it. The adults kept things secretive, but we sensed something was cooking. We put two and two together to paint a composite picture of what we perceive as complicated adult life. Sometimes, we understand more than we were expected to know. Other times, we got it all totally wrong.

This movie portrays the emotions beautifully that a child goes through the heady times of childhood in the uncertain times after the Spanish Civil War. Estella lives in the Northern part of Spain with her parents. Her parents are not precisely the lovey-dovey type of couple. The father is a medical doctor engrossed in his psychological experiments while the mother is contended to play housewife and knitting. There is not much intimacy going on; Father stays alone in the upstairs room.

Snooping around, Estella suspects that Father may have a movie star lover whom he jilted when he left the South. Father was active in the Spanish War on the Republican side against General Franco. His father, however, was on Franco's side. Both father and son had a falling, and Estella's father left with bad blood.

Realistically, Estella's father is suffering from PTSD. It could be a culmination of many reasons - his disappointment with the Civil War, his departure from the South, leaving his old girlfriend, trapped in a loveless marriage and the dull weather of the North.

As the years go by, Estella slowly understands what her father is going through, but nothing can predict what goes through his mind. All the while, the South remains a mysterious area to Estella. A single visit by her paternal in her childhood makes it even more intriguing. One day, Estella gets her chance to go down and endure the South. She goes there to study. The second part of her experience is not there in the film as it ends there.