01/09/2005

A veritable specialist of melodrama, the spanish director Isabelle Coixet received an ovation from the public at the screening out of competition in the Horizons of La vida secreta de las palabras [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Isabel Coixet
film profile] (The Secret Life of Words). Shot in English and played by north American actors Sarah Polley and Tim Robbins, the filmmaker’s fourth feature delves deep with empathy into the heavy secrets already explored in her previous work: My life without me [+see also:
trailer
film profile] (2003). But this time, it does not deal with a murder announced, but a social encounter that sets off a difficult journey back to Life.

Following the story of Hanna, and lonely young woman, almost mutic, who works in a factory, the screenplay written by the director moves the action swiftly to a petrol platform in the north sea where a man has received serious burns in an accident. Hanna, caught up in a chance encounter, find herself in the position of nurse, a job she held in her previous mysterious life. So she drowns slowly in the relationship with the injured man who cannot open his eyes. But the humour at the start gives way to the revelation of the young woman’s secrets, dating from her suffering during the war in ex-Yugoslavia. Patiently weaving the fabric of this meeting of two souls deadened by life, Isabelle Coixet succeeds in distilling sincere emotion based on their power of communication, lightened by quick portraits of the inhabitants of the platform (among them Javier Camara) and punctuated with numerous musical passages. A victory of life and love over the despair and guilt linked to the past which seduced the Venice public thanks to the talent of its two principal actors.

Shot in Madrid and in Northern Ireland, The Secret Life of Words was produced by El Deseo, company run by the Almodovar brothers and had a budget of 5 million dollars. Co-produced by MediaPro Group with the support of TVE - Televisión Española, Catalan television (TVC) and from Canal + Spain, it will be released in Spain on the 28th October.

(Translated from French)