Last Days of Spring

Isabel Lamberti's feature debut, which won the Best First Feature Award at San Sebastian, takes us to a small, neglected town on the outskirts of Madrid. The Gabarre-Mendoza family celebrates their grandson's birthday, but a police inspection interrupts the festivities. This has become the strained reality prevalent in the area ever since the land was sold, forcing the residents to gradually leave their homes. The Spanish director works here with a real family who has experienced a painful evacuation, and she succeeds in bringing something new and refreshing to the genre. This is a neo-realistic work based more upon the fragments of life than a narrative arc, one that will reward and move the devoted viewers.