“My parents didn’t just argue,” Carmela told her best friend from school, her face darkening. But she doesn’t elaborate.
“Have you ever seen your father be violent? Has he ever treated you badly?” the judge asks Carmela later in the film, in a key scene shown in the new trailer for The Good Daughter, directed by Catalan director Julia de Paz Sorvas. Carmella’s response is not shown in the teaser.
The Good Daughter, distributed by Beta Cinema, will have its world premiere in the main competition of the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival from November 7th to 23rd. The story begins with Carmela meeting her father in a safe room to avoid seeing her mother, and her mother dropping her off. Carmela loves her parents, adores her father who is preparing for an art exhibition, and wants to remain loyal to her father no matter what she does or what it costs her.
What he does to Carmela causes her great emotional pain, both psychological and physical, and she tries to bear it in silence.
“The Good Daughter,” co-written with Nuria Dunho López (“Ama,” “Joan Samsam”), is the second feature-length work by De Paz Sorvas, whose debut film “Ama” was selected for the 2021 variety show “Tracking Spanish Talents.” She became even more famous this year with her co-writing of “Querer,” which won the top grand prize at Europe’s biggest television festival, Seriesmania.
While there have been films about gender violence before, “The most remarkable thing about ‘The Good Daughter’ is definitely its point of view. The films I like the most are the ones that present a point of view that I had never considered before,” says Sergio Globas, a producer at Barcelona-based Astra Pictures, which co-produced it with Madrid’s Avalon Pictures and Belgium’s Klatin Films.
Variety spoke to De Paz Sorvas ahead of the Black Nights Film Festival, where The Good Daughter is one of the big highlights of the new films at Focus on Catalonia, hosted by Tallinn Festival, which is taking film festivals by storm and has emerged as one of the richest co-production forces in Europe and Latin America.
Does the teaser you chose to share with Variety drive the heart of the film, which is exploring gender violence from the often-unconsidered angle of daughters? How did you come to explore that?
When we discuss a problem, Nuria, who is the co-writer of this film, and I always start with research, and in this case it took more or less four or five years. I wanted to explore gender-based violence. So we started interviewing victims and survivors. As I talked to them, I realized that the majority were very concerned about their children. Children were not considered victims in most cases because they did not suffer direct physical or sexual violence from their abusive fathers. As a militant feminist, I’m surprised I hadn’t thought of this…
Is your son or daughter not receiving psychological counseling?
At both the judicial and social levels, it is difficult to characterize psychological violence as violence because it is, to use that expression, more subtle. It is even more difficult to qualify as violence because there is no evidence to prove it, such as physical abuse or sexual abuse. What we found is that the Spanish judiciary prioritizes the father’s family, the role of the father, over the character of the abuser.
And have you talked to children of victims of gender-based violence?
Yes, the mothers asked their children (usually around Carmela’s age in the movie) if they wanted to be interviewed. We interviewed our son and daughter and had them talk about what they felt comfortable with. Their comments enriched the script. The script was also revised by Raúl Lizana, Spain’s foremost expert on vicarious violence. This is when a perpetrator who does not have direct access to the woman he wishes to harm, uses that violence against someone important to her.
Did you interview the invaders?
We met with men imprisoned for gender-based violence. It’s easy to fall into clichés. We wanted to show that they are not always monsters, that they have cycles of violence, that sometimes they are spontaneous and seductive, and that there are moments of light. We wanted to create a sense of duality in the moment where Carmela is with her father and in a way is obsessed with him. We want our audience to understand that there is no concrete figure of a victim of gender-based violence, and that what we are led to believe is far more complex.
Within the first half hour or so of the film, we understand that the father has been guilty of gender-based violence, but we don’t see it. That creates tension and suspense.
Yes, “Querer” has some kind of similarities. The point is that the audience is asked to fill in the gaps and question a less obvious kind of violence. In the swimming pool scene, it’s not entirely clear if this was the match they just watched. For example, in “Querer” I wanted to show my husband’s posts, not his attacks.
What were your guidelines as a director?
I wanted to follow Carmela every moment without criticizing her. I also wanted the film to capture light in things that move between darkness and light, such as her relationships with her friends and her first kiss. I also wanted to play with the space. I asked art director Victor Santacana to make sure that even if Carmela wasn’t in the space, she could be present for the audience.
And do you feel yourself to be part of the new generation of Catalan filmmakers, many of whom are women, who have made a big splash in the last decade?
It is true that on a conscious level, we all feel part of a network that we have built together, although perhaps not so much. Eva Libertad (“Def”), Gemma Blasco (“La Furia”) or Sara Fantova from “Joan, Somebody” are my friends. I’ve grown up with them too. If you have questions, ask them or other friends. For example, Arauda Ruiz de Azua, the writer and director of “Querer,” helped edit “The Good Daughter.” We have this support network between us.
