After years away Ariel returns to Buenos Aires seeking to reconnect with his father who has founded a charity foundation in Once, the city’s Jewish district where Ariel spent his youth. But Usher appears to be staving off a meeting with his son; instead he keeps roping him into a number of small assignments during the course of which Ariel meets Eva who volunteers for Usher’s charity. Like Ariel, she too feels estranged from her father, and no longer speaks. Together they look back at the past in order to shape the present. Eva’s radiant inner strength and independent spirit inspires Ariel to come to grips with the religious customs of his Jewish community as well as the traditions that once divided him and his father and rethink his own identity. After El abrazo partido (in Competition in 2004) und Derecho de familia (in Panorama in 2006), Daniel Burman once more explores the interplay of forces within a father-son relationship. Tenderly, and with a lightness of touch, he has Ariel let go of his old expectations and allow himself to be drawn into the centre of a vibrant and fascinating community. berlinale 2016
