Over the last five years, Jorge Xolalpa has redefined independent filmmaking, by simply grabbing his iPhone and making Blue Line Station. Since then, he has experimented with different themes, styles, and stories – Thrillers, mind-bending psychological dramas, and deeply personal character pieces. With his latest film, Melancolía, Jorge tackles tragedy and grief.
Melancolía follows Dolores (Alessandra Rosaldo), a hospice nurse who just lost her daughter in a school shooting. We follow her through her daily routine, the daily struggle of providing care and dealing with her patient’s shady family members, and most importantly those reflective moments in between, where we get to see just how broken she really feels.
At the heart of this film is Alessandra Rosaldo. With several highly anticipated performances, this year from Lady Gaga, Frances McDormand, Jennifer Hudson, and Kristen Stewart – all of which are strong contenders for awards season – Alessandra Rosaldo’s performance should not be slept on. One needn’t look hard to find a big, showy “Oscar clip” – she has plenty of moments where she lets loose and in a big, emotional breakdown, and those moments are amazing. But there’s also real magic in the smaller moments, where the camera lingers on her face, and she lets her eyes do all the acting.
There’s a choice Xolalpa makes right at the beginning of the film, to jolt you into a moment of anguish and despair – and that feeling is present throughout the entire film. Much of that work does come from Rosaldo’s performance and Raquel Gallego’s stunning cinematography, but from a storytelling standpoint, the dark and suffocating grief never lets up, which allows the audience to take that emotional journey with Dolores. While this isn’t a film I would recommend if you’re not in a great place mentally, there’s something immensely gripping and heartbreaking about the whole experience.
The pacing of the film is also deliberate. We are with Dolores as she cares for dying patients. We linger on those moments, watching her go through the motions and trying to work through her sadness, and the fact that she’s a hospice nurse and the kinds of things that she experiences really drives home a feeling of hopelessness and futility. On the opposite end of that, we get scenes where she interacts with others – including her estranged husband, where she really gets to lay into him everything she is feeling. Even in seeking some semblance of help by way of a support group, she finds little to no comfort. The film acknowledges that her coping mechanisms aren’t the healthiest, but also posits the question, how does one cope with something like this? The emotional tension in this film is so thick you can cut it with a knife, the slow-burn allows all of her grief thoroughly sink in, and culminates in an ending that can best be described as a slow-motion gut punch. The audience is allowed no reprieve from the film’s somber tone.
Jorge Xolalpa has a natural talent for filmmaking, and a tremendous skill for storytelling. Melancolía is a downer, for sure, and for that reason alone some might find it difficult to get through. Much like Michael Haneke’s Amour, the film is emotionally taxing and very depressing. But to continue to witness the talent of a rising star like Jorge Xolalpa and a tour-de-force performance from Alessandra Rosaldo, Melancolía is definitely one to watch.