Zöe Stein as Catalina and Lluis Homar as Tomeu

When 16-year-old Cata, sensitively played by Zoë Stein, witnesses her beloved grandmother’s fatal fall, while on holiday with her sister Eva (Martina García Cursach) in Mallorca, she struggles to come to terms with the loss and the vacuum left behind.  With its idyllic and luminous Mallorcan setting and the documentary style intimacy of the camerawork, Aleñar Iglesias creates a gentle other-worldly feel to the film. 

Cata’s grandmothers’ absence leads her to seek out what remains. Unable to cry with her grief, she reaches out for her in the things that have stayed behind:  trinkets, clothes, and objects, that are full of nostalgia. The pain and the alienating power of not only dressing up, but discovering she is so similar to her dead grandmother that she by wearing her clothes she is almost recreating her, she starts to be aware that it is as if she were bringing her back to life again. 

Zöe Stein

"You will not stop feeling her presence, she is always here!

Mourning and grief, with the pain and cathartic quality of being naturally so like a relative, awakens a strange connection with her grandfather Tomeu, reflecting a ghostly bond and quality of re-birth in the continuum of life.  The word forastera could be translated as ‘stranger’ or imposter, as Lucía Aleñar iglesias expresses in an interview for Cinema Gavia (by Diego la Costa): -

“I think that we all feel like imposters or strangers, especially when very young. We try on many different masks and personalities, to see how they fit… [but] what happens when the fancy dress is too perfect?”

The kitchen light flickers as if turned on and off by an invisible force, is it a ghost?  Cata and her sister Eva comfort each other by sleeping in the same bed. Mother’s arrival does little to dissipate the vacuum as old resentments come to the surface, and Cata feels ever more alienated. 

Zöe Stein as Catalina and Martina García Cursach as Eva

She toys with her Swedish boyfriend (Nonni Ardal) but remains separate, unable to mourn, a fact that disturbs her deeply. 

Meanwhile, Tomeu, the grandfather, played by Lluís Homar, is almost too charismatic altogether, as he steals the show in every scene he is in. This is a little confusing as we are pulled in different directions, unable to place him definitely in the past as the old grandfather. Is he supposed to be vulnerable or is he stronger than them all? Meanwhile, Pepa (Núria Prims), the mother's arrival introduces tensions that involuntarily come to the surface.

Having seen the earlier short film, from which this feature  was developed, I feel that the superb camera work (by Alana Mejía González) on that production managed to convey a supernatural feel better than this new feature, with cinematographer Agnés Pigué Corbera. 

Corbera has captured the stunning luminosity of the set, but I was sorry that some more intimate details were lost, like the girl finding some of her grandmother’s hair on one of her dresses, as if it might have just fallen off.  Such poignant moments are not as frequent, so it is harder to empathize with the lead.  One wonders if the short needed to be expanded into a feature film and whether much has been gained. 

Lucía Aleñar Iglesias, director.

Forastera is visually beautiful, and the stunning light and Mallorca setting creating a constant in the background, that holds the film together, but it is hard to feel the depths of the girl’s emotions and experience the characters to the full.  Aleñar Iglesias is clearly anxious to avoid a predictable. ‘obvious’ narrative, but one questions whether she might have gone too far in the opposite direction, making it hard to engage with the characters and empathize with Cata’s predicament.

FORASTERA (2025)

Writer/Director Lucía Aleñar Iglesias / Producers: Ariadna Dot, Tomo Folguera, Cesc Mulet, Bàrbara Ferrer. Marta Cruañas Compés. Giovanni Pompili, Olivier Guerpillon and Marta Reguera / DOP Agnés Pigué Corbera/ Editor: Paola Freddi / Original Music: Anna con Hausswolff and Filip Leyman/ Sound Designer: Ulrike Akander.

CAST: Cata: Zöe Stein /Tomeu: Lluís Homar / Pepa: Núria Prims  /Eva: Martina García Cursach/ Catalina:María Angelat /Man: Nonni Ardal