MIFF Session #7: THE IDEA OF A LAKE

Ines' imminent motherhood has brought memories of her own parents to the surface. When one of those parents disappeared in the Peron years while the family was on holiday the nostalgia has a sting to it. She is preparing a photographic memoir of the years, particularly the holidays they had by the lake in the south of Argentina.

Meanwhile more concrete memories are being called through forensic archaeologists who are seeking to identify the remains of people killed during the Dirty War. Ines' brother complies with the request for a blood sample but their mother feels only the pain beneath her anger. Ines' estranged husband worries about the stress' effect on their unborn child.

Woven through this are beautifully drawn scenes of summer holidays including a disarming fantasy in which the young Ines performs a water ballet with the animate and now amphibious family Renault to the sounds of Neil Diamond's Songs Sung Blue. But this is nostalgia, art directed memory, the real thing, the facts and their sensory impressions begin to bleed in as she recalls the kids playing hide and seek in the woods which for all its cuteness leaves the young Ines unsmiling and the poignant sight of her father leaving the candlelit table of partying family friends and walking into the darkness. Here, the memory is too painful but can't be trusted to nostalgia. She can only go as far as the spectre of him softly crooning a lullaby to her infant self. All further investigation is unbearable.

The water of this lake is still and deep. Writer/director Milagros Mumenthaler exercises great restraint, trusting her cast to convey much with minimal dialogue but big colourful canvasses that make up for it. Mumenthaler also trusts her audience to understand that she is saying only what she needs to say and they will share the load.