The Value Of Time

Watching this tale of an ageing doctor tending the “grave” of his wife whose body had been cryogenically frozen, potentially to allow medical science one day to bring her back to life, you cannot help but wonder what Luis Buñuel would have made of it.

Perhaps it’s unfair to mention director Xavier Bermúdez in such illustrious compan, yet sadly he leaves plenty of time for such musings.

The pacing is slow and deliberate while this eccentric individual with a strong moral streak makes for a less than engaging lead character.

Unfolding over the seasons the film reveals the dead Amalia (Marta Larralde) in a series of photographs and home movies. She looks beautiful and flirtatious – so much so that you wish she would rise from the grave.

The old man (Ernesto Chao) is supported by Corona (Nerea Barros), his housekeeper and nurse with whom he has an ambivalently intimate connection, and his son (Manuel Cortes) who comes on a visit. He seems to have a cordial bond with his father even although they are worlds apart in spirit.

From a wider perspective, the film’s themes are to do with relationships, growing older, death and the layers of feeling that lurk beneath the surface. Such ambitions founder in a meandering narrative.