The Map to Reach You premiered at the 29th Málaga Film Festival, in the official documentary section, where it deservedly won the top prize: the Silver Biznaga for Best Film in the section (read news). However, although everything had been arranged for the director, Mercedes Afonso, and her 20-year-old son, Airam Concepción Afonso, to attend the film festival, his disappearance – which occurred on 16 February following an autism-related meltdown – prevented the filmmaker from leaving the mountainous Canary Island of La Palma, where they both live, so as not to interrupt the search for him. At the time of writing, his whereabouts remain unknown.

As shown in the film The Map to Reach You, for twelve years this courageous mother has documented the ups and downs of her son’s daily life. He has been diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) and PANDAS (Paediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorders Associated with Streptococci), and she films him with two aims: to document his behaviours as medical evidence, and to distance herself from the pain by looking through the camera. The illness afflicting this child, who later grows into a teenager and eventually into an adult with extraordinarily beautiful eyes that reveal all his fragility and sensitivity, triggers sudden episodes in which panic, isolation and obsession collide. Filming him, sometimes from behind his bedroom door with only his screams audible, becomes a way for her to reach out, to touch him gently and softly, to bridge the chasm that open between them when he is having a seizure. The film’s title alludes to this, and one of its most beautiful shots shows only his feet and a mother’s hand.

At times tough, yet always sensitive and loving, The Map to Reach You (written by Mercedes Afonso and edited by Emma Tusell) is a priceless and utterly candid audiovisual documentary that lays itself bare to raise awareness of a devastating condition that can plunge a family into turmoil. The house, built in the island’s traditional style, where Mercedes lives with her two children – the younger, Irene, calmly adapting to the measures they must take when her older brother is overwhelmed by his symptoms – becomes another witness to this struggle against adversity. And the volcano that erupted a few years ago on La Palma, the island where the family lives, serves as a powerful metaphor for what unfolds in this feature film: a place where pain coexists with light and hope. The film has already won the first of what will surely be many awards at the Málaga Film Festival.

The Map to Reach You is a film by the Spanish company Lunática Producciones Audiovisuales in association with Bocacha Films (Uruguay). Agencia Freak handles its international distribution and sales.