THE FEAR

Veteran Catalan director Jordi Cadena needs just 75 minutes to put together a distressing and suffocating psychological horror film that exposes abuse and violence within families. Selected by the Valladolid Seminci, the film focuses on a 16-year-old boy, his mother, and his sister, who fall prey to a dreadful panic when their unnatural father is at home. As forceful, powerful, straightforward, and necessary as it is short.

A teenage boy is unable to sleep. The next morning he, his mother and younger sister emerge from their bedrooms only when their father has left. When the latter returns unexpectedly for something he has forgotten, the family freeze in fear. The stony silence conveys more than any words could about the terror the father inspires in them. Jordi Cadena (Elisa K, LFF 2010) crafts a powerful, menacing film about the effects of domestic violence on two generations of a family, melding sparse storytelling, a dark visual palette and memorable performances to compelling effect.