Digging up Family History Brings up Hidden Secrets in Carla Simón's Romería

A Young Woman Searches for Her Lost Parents in the Graceful, Restorative 'Roméria'

Llúcia Garcia in Romería —Courtesy of Janus FilmsIn a culture that tends to favor flashy, look-at-me filmmaking, a director with a gentle touch is sometimes just the breezy caress we need. Spanish writer-director Carla Simón has fashioned a shimmering, affecting fictionalized story from one that she lived firsthand: her parents died of AIDS when she was very young, and she was left in the care of her uncle and his family. What were her birth par…

In “Romeria,” Autobiography Mixes With Fantasy as the Director Searches for the Truth About Her Parents’ Deaths

With her third film, Carla Simón crafts a dreamy coming-of-age tale that questions the very nature of memory.

Digging up family history brings up hidden secrets in Carla Simón's Romería

Taking inspiration from her own life, writer-director Carla Simón’s Romería is a moving self-portrait about searching for your past. Looking towards her future, Marina (Llúcia Garcia) must confirm her father’s parentage to apply for a college scholarship. Since he died years ago, she must approach her estranged family to get their blessing. This means journeying to the picturesque Spanish town of Vigo armed with only her mother’s diaries and the…

‘Romería’ Turns Summer Into Memory

Llúcia Garcia, discovered for Carla Simon’s film while walking the streets as she returned from summer camp, delivers a captivating lead performance.

‘Romería’ Review: Family Lies and a Videotape

What do we owe the dead? And what do the dead owe us? Often, those meaty, existential questions are easy to flick away — I’d rather think about what’s for lunch — but Carla Simón’s swoony, loosely-autofictional “Romería” forces engagement as a matter of necessity. In three feature films, Simón (“Alcarras”) has repeatedly turned the lens [...] The post ‘Romería’ Review: Family Lies and a Videotape appeared first on The Movie Buff.

“Memory Is Not Something You Can Trust”: Carla Simón on Romería, Family Stories, and Antonioni

Excavating her past in deeply moving ways, Spanish filmmaker Carla Simón has completed her family trilogy with Romería, following her debut Summer 1993 and Golden Bear winner Alcarràs. When a teenager visits the Atlantic coast of Spain to meet her paternal grandparents, she begins piecing together the mysteries of her past. Rory O’Connor said in his Cannes review last year, “Continuing in the low-key register of her Golden Bear winner Alcarràs, …