NAVIDAD

Chile/France, 2009, 84 minutes, Colour.
Manuela Martelli, Alicia Rodriguez, Diego Ruiz.
Directed by Sebastian Lelio.

Navidad is a short story, a sketch and impression of three characters. It is set over the Christmas period – though there is little relationship between the characters, themes and the season. It is set in Santiago and then in the Chilean countryside with a climax showing the grandeur of the Andes.

The film shows a young couple going to a country house. They make the house ready for a holiday, quarrel when the young man sees a letter to his girlfriend from a friend of hers and suspects a relationship. He decides to leave. However, he discovers another young woman, suffering from diabetes and in need of sugar. He brings her into the household, they help her recover. As the time goes on, the ill young woman tries to contact her father to meet him and the couple take her. However, there is no meeting with the father and she attempts suicide. The couple rescue her. Then, unexpectedly, the film moves into an emotional and sexual threesome. The film does not end there, rather tracing what happens to each of the characters in the aftermath of their experience.

The film is one about young people, identity, relationships, sexuality, irresponsibility and responsibility.

1.The impact of the film? Characters, interactions? In the Chilean context?

2.The Chilean countryside, the house, the interiors, the surrounding grounds? The contrast with the town, the park? The culmination in the drive through the Andes? And the comparison with the ordinary streets in the city? The musical score?

3.The title – and any reference to the Christmas season? Or not?

4.The introduction to Aurora and Alex? Arrival, hopping over the gate, getting into the house, tidying it up, discovering things? Their relationship, love? The shower, the tension, Alex discovering the letter from Lisa, confronting Aurora? Her reaction? His decision to leave? The immaturity and impulsiveness?

5.Alex discovering Alicia, the shed, her collapse, their reviving her, her need for sugar? Getting well again? Questioning her? Her story about running away, her mother, wanting to know where her father was, the phone calls, trying to contact him? The decision to leave? Alex and Aurora taking her, waiting in the park, watching, the car picking up a young woman, Alicia and her running away, going into the water, their rescuing her and taking her back?

6.Back at the house, calm? Aurora and Alicia and the attraction? Alicia’s initiative, Aurora’s response? Alex and his watching? The three gradually being absorbed into communication with each other? Emotional, sexual? The aftermath?

7.Aurora, leaving? The truth about Lisa, taking the cushion? Her farewell to Alex? The issue of where her true feelings lay? Alex and his leaving with Alicia, in the train, going home, Alex taking the blow-up figure, their putting it in the square by the road, its inflating, deflating? Symbolic?

8.Three young people, confusion, identity, relationships – and their future?