The Spirit of the Beehive

1973 drama

Rating: 17/20

Plot: A family in post-war Spain struggles with identity. The beekeeper father is withdrawn and depressed. The mother is having an affair. Isabelle, the malicious older sister, mistreats the gullible younger sister Anna. After the two children watch Frankenstein, Anna's sister convinces her that the monster lives nearby. A fugitive drifts in, setting off a series of events that causes Anna to withdraw into a fantasy world of poisonous mushrooms and Frankenstein monsters.

Funnily, I didn't really think I was liking this one while watching it. It's that typical "Shane movie," slowly-evolving with a dependence on visuals more than on dialogue and story. The acting is good, an emphasis on body language and very little dialogue. Child actors are never supposed to be this good. Words are scarce, and none are wasted. There's something really depressing about the way the family members are filmed; they're alienated, lonely, broken. And that's shown artfully not just with the lack of communication but also in the way they don't share camera time. The girls are on the screen together at times, but the husband and wife never are. That's most striking in a scene where the husband is coming to bed late after obsessing over bees he has in a glass hive, and his wife pretends to be sleeping. The camera never drifts from her while we see the sheet tugged and a slouched shadow on the wall and hear his getting-into-bed sounds. Lots of people will find this all boring, but I thought it was a mesmerizingly realistic glimpse at troubled people. Poetic and moving, this has to be one of the most quiet movies I've ever seen. I wonder what I'm missing politically or historically, but a knowledge of Spanish history wasn't necessary for me to enjoy this one. I think this has a lot in common with Days of Heaven (visually) and that strange Terry Gilliam movie Tideland (narrative and thematically).