Trece campanadas

This tale of a young sculptor haunted by the malicious ghost of his dead father takes its time to get going, but once it does it becomes an interesting, watchable tale with a nice satisfying conclusion. It cleverly keeps the audience guessing about whether the ghost is real or the result of schizophrenia, and has some great looking locations. Its all a little low-key but is definitely worth a look.

In 1984, in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, the boy Jacobo witnesses his mother killing his father, the artist Mateo (Luis Tosar), with a shotgun when the local cathedral sounded thirteen tolls. Eighteen years later, the also artist Jacobo (Juan Diego Botto) returns to his hometown from Buenos Aires answering the call of his childhood friend Maria (Marta Etura) to visit his schizophrenic mother that has been sentenced to a psychiatric hospital for killing her husband. Jacobo believed his mother had died years ago, and he is under medication due to frequent clangs of bell that he hears. Jacobo is advised by his mother to leave the town, and sooner he is haunted by Mateo that wants him to finish his work for the local cathedral.

"Trece Campanadas" is an underrated psychological / supernatural thriller. The story is well constructed and resolved in spite of I have partially guessed the mystery in the middle of the movie; therefore, the director Xavier Villaverde and the writers have successfully accomplished their objective of making a good movie. The unknown (at least for me) Juan Diego Botto and Marta Etura have great performances and show a perfect chemistry and Luis Tosar gives another efficient work. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "13 Badaladas" ("13 Tolls")

I'm not the one to go and watch scary movies. I bought this title on the internet and the synopsis did not tell anything about the anguish that runs throughout the story. It only told about a young artist that goes back home to see his mother who is in a mental health hospital, and back there he has to tackle unresolved questions about his childhood. If I had read about what the unresolved questions were about, and how Jacobo tackled them I would have not bought this movie, and it would have been a pity.

I liked this movie a lot. It was written so well you don't understand if Jacobo's father is really there hurting his son or not until the very end of the movie, you just see the escalating fear, anger and pain in Jacobo's face as in Marìa's eyes as a reflex. The physical violent scenes, which have to be present in thrillers, are not too many and are scattered throughout the movie to help in reaching the climax of the action and they are not too scary. It's the mental status of the two main characters that frightens the viewer. The cathedral's setting adds to it and, also, the weather which is mainly dark and raining as to stress on the fact that Jacobo as big black clouds filling his mind.

I think that this movie, which is not related so much to Spain as a cultural region, might be of interest to a wide audience.The setting might have been any cathedral in the western world, and the story theme is universal: how and if an abused child can grow up and move past a devastating mental illness. And, it's a great movie about friendship and love, as well. Marìa risks a lot to help Jacopo. She quits an affair with a well known and stable psychiatrist and she goes against her mom's advice not to get involved because those who have been hurt often hurt others as hurt is the only thing they know .

Both Marta Etura and Juan Diego Botto were great, but Luis Tosar was astonishing. He could look tender and caring and a few moments after he was looking so frightening and mean.

Jacobo (Juan Diego )is a young sculptor that goes back to Santiago of Compostela, to see his mummy (Elvira Minguez), locked up a psychiatric hospital for to murder to her husband named Mateo (Luis Tosar), when he thought she dead years ago . To their arrival, visions of Mateo, his dead father several years ago, begin to chase to him, especially, when thirteen peals sounded in the cathedral, fact what obsesses to Jacobo . Fatigued of insomnia receives estrange and indecipherable visions that seem a bizarre riddle and going on with odds events are happening when he aware the true intentions of the ghost of his father. He hasn't slept and suffers hallucinations , risking his own life causing injuries by hanging . Psychopathic, haunting visions by Jacobo and his madness embroils two women ,a beautiful young ( Marta Etura ) who falls in love with him , and an art gallery owner (Laura Maña) increasingly besides with apparition his father a who nobody have ever seen . He tries to resolve which believes to be a scheme against him and various mysterious deeds occur until the final enigma . After watching long time, the father convinces Jacobo to make the work for the cathedral that Mateo couldn't terminate in life, but what starts as a simple job turns a nightmare .

The film contains mystery, violence, suspense in a dark atmosphere with imposing tension and intrigue. Juan Diego who holds a strong Argentinian accent makes a fine performance as depressed young who returns his native town that leads a madness spiral. He is well accompanied by gloomy characters as Luis Tosar as reappeared father .The film is well shot in Santiago De Compostela , showing spectacularly the monuments, streets and the breathtaking cathedral . Colorful cinematography by Javier Salmones is good , creating a frightening and scary atmosphere . Mesmerizing and intriguing musical score by Javier Navarrete. The flick is finely produced by the chairman of Filmax Productions , Julio Fernandez , a successful producer and expert on terror genre , producer of hits as ¨The machinist¨, ¨Rec 1, y 2¨ ,¨ Fragiles¨, ¨Darkness¨, and many others . The motion picture is middling realized by Galician director Xavier Villaverde , because resulting to be slow moving and little bit boring , it's his third film , formerly he directed ¨Continental¨ and ¨Finisterre¨ . The picture was a box office flop being the filmmaker's last work . Rating : Average .

Does anyone have any idea why this was rated nc-17? I saw nothing that would put it anywhere close to a "hard R", much less a more adult rating. Once again, the ratings board throws a curve to anyone interested in movies with more controversial/graphic/racy content, as this one shows none of that at all. Could it be that it was edited out after the nc-17 was awarded? If so, this makes no sense---why would you release the movie as an unrated edition and cleave out the content that made it an nc-17? A question better plied to the distributors, perhaps... Despite my questions, I really enjoyed the movie. Not a totally novel premise, but well produced and acted.

Also--IMDb needs to fix their software, typing nc-17 in all caps is correct, not shouting!