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‘Tis the season to be frightened.
Soon, many will be feasting on that exquisite bloody banquet known as Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu. But first, Doppelganger Releasing presents us with a moody and quite disturbing tapa from Spain, specifically the Catalonia region, titled You Are Not Me (Tú no eres yo).
While following the rules of the classic psychological horror film, filmmaking partners Marisa Crespo and Moisés Romera—whose debut feature, 2013’s 75-minute-long La insólita aventura de Javi contra el tiempo (Javi’s Extraordinary Adventure Against Time), was an interactive film in which audiences decided the outcome of the story through an app in their smartphones—again have some fun with their viewers, throwing red herrings left and right while ramping up the paranoia. The film also wears its influences on its sleeves; by the time a pivotal Christmas dinner takes place, Crespo’s and Romera’s admiration for Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby becomes quite clear, even as they add a drop of Buñuelian surrealism (what if the characters at the heart of The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie had had their dinner after all?). They also turn the conventions of the traditional dysfunctional family Christmas film on its head by, of all things, addressing issues of white privilege.
Three years after she ran away from home and a pre-arranged marriage and made a life for herself working for an NGO in Brazil, Aitana (Roser Tapias) flies back to Valencia on Christmas Eve with her Afro-Brazilian partner Gabi (Yapoena Silva) and their newly adopted Afro-Brazilian son João to surprise her conservative parents Dori (Pilar Almería) and Justo (Alfred Picó), and her brother Saúl (Jorge Motos) who suffers from a motor-neuron disease. Aitana is the one who ends up being taken by surprise when the door to her parents' villa is opened by an unknown woman named Pepita (Pilar Martínez) who claims to be a friend of the family and is staying there with her husband Oriol (Álvaro Baguena) for the night.
To say that Aitana’s parents are not pleased by the surprise visit would be quite an understatement. But what makes this visit that much more awkward is the presence of a Romanian woman named Nadia (Anna Kurikka, made up to look like an Eastern European cousin of Mia Goth) who has been “adopted” as a surrogate daughter by the once anti-immigrant Dori and Justo. Not only is Nadia sleeping in Aitana’s room but she is also wearing her clothes and her grandmother’s jewelry. Who is this Goldilocks who has invaded the space that once belonged to Aitana?
With all the house's rooms taken and scarce hotel availability nearby, Aitana and Gabi have no choice, for now, but to sleep in the villa’s old turret. That doesn’t stop Aitana from finding out who this intruder is and how she managed to steal her parents' affection. She sneaks around the villa’s shadowy staircases and hallways, most decorated with hunting trophies; climbs down balconies and rooftops; eavesdrops on conversations; and even sneaks into her old room to rifle through Nadia’s belongings.
There are nightmares and locked rooms aplenty, and Aitana even catches Saúl talking to whom he claims to be their grandfather’s spirit. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that the film opens with an omen of sorts, when Aitana almost runs over a piglet on her way to her parents’ place. There is also plenty of talk in the house of how to properly feed and cook a piglet, not to mention that João is compared to a nice fat piglet during that Christmas dinner.
Oh, yes, that Christmas dinner where an international gathering of elderly white men and women led by one Father Nicholas (Crespo and Romera are certainly having their fair share of fun) gather around Dori’s and Justo’s table. There is awkward talk about how all inclusive their little club is. Why, they now invite Jews and Blacks as members! Meanwhile, Pepita serves Saúl, Gabi and Aitana with one of her specialty drinks—one after another. This wouldn’t be a perfect dysfunctional family Christmas movie if a half-drunk Aitana didn't stand up, open her mouth, vilify her parents and accuse Nadia of taking advantage of them. But there’s much more in that party than meets the eye and that’s where the creepy fun begins.
Crespo’s and Romera’s script and direction are full of false clues and misdirection. Things are not always what they seem, especially when the whole film is told from Aitana’s point of view. We know what she knows, we suspect what she suspects…and we are as much in the dark as she is. Tapias’ performance is pitch-perfect, all wide-eyed, angry, exasperated and desperate. The whole cast is on point, from Silva’s more open-minded, empathetic and questioning Gabi to Picó’s stern, disapproving father. The movie is a brilliant and quite economic exercise in claustrophobia as the action hardly leaves the compound. And then there’s the quite freaky arrangement composer Joan Vilà makes of a classic Christmas song in the film’s final moments which makes You Are Not Me that much more delightfully perverse.
You Are Not Me is, undoubtedly, an auspicious calling card for two filmmakers whose short films have only been seen in festivals and their sole feature film in special screenings. They are worth keeping an eye out for.
The film opens in select theaters and on digital on December 6.