And then a Hierro comes along...

Hierro
Starring: Elena Anaya, Hugo Arbues, Jon Arino
Director: Gabe Ibanez
Rating: 3 (out of 5)

Summary: While travelling on board a ferry to a distant Canary Island of El Hierro, Maria loses her son Diego. Has he fallen overboard? Has he been abducted? Nobody knows. Diego simply vanishes...

Equal parts thriller, ghost story and a tale of a Mother's grief, Hierro manages to toe the imaginative line of recent Spanish supernatural films whilst utilising Hollywood dramatic convention by way of an almost Asian horror sensibility. This strange combination of genres makes for a giddy mixture of highs and lows which can leave the viewer in a state of frenzied nail biting one minute and then calmly checking them the next.

Starting with a night time aerial shot of a speeding car racing through the rough terrain of the island, Hierro sets a fast pace but has too many left turns into surreal imagery which leave the wheels to fall off. One example of this is how the performance of Elena Anaya is handled. She is able to portray vulnerability, strength and most importantly heartbreak as the film reaches its conclusion but first time director Gabe Ibanez seems more eager to show off his bag of camera tricks than let her be the focus point of the film.

You can forgive this as naivety due in part to this being the director's first feature. Almost as if he's getting used to the conventions of the full length discipline and for all his shortcomings Ibanez does manage to keep the film down to a snappy hour and a half which at least floats by rather than flies, but at best his flights of fancy are infuriating rather than head scratching - and in some cases don't really make sense or add anything.

The real pleasure with Hierro is watching the plot unfold and seeing Elena Anaya's struggle to find the truth about the disappearance of her son against the backdrop of the almost other worldly terrain of El Hierro. The island is another character. Windswept, battered by the sea and covered in black sand. It's isolation from the rest of the world makes the uncovering of the unsympathetic truth even more frightening and tense. Believe me, the Canary Island tourist board aren't going to suddenly find a flock of visitors ditching Tenerife for this party island. Accommodation is at most two star.

As the film hurtles towards the final reel, it starts to swerve as erratically as the car did in the opening five minutes, losing the guile to stick with the violent nihilism hinted at and falling into conventional thriller territory of untrustworthy police and hackneyed plot points. This dichotomy between the disturbing subject matter and the need to keep the movie appealing to a wider audience means Hierro becomes rather gutless and almost betrays the fantastically brave work put on screen by Anaya during the tense and spooky first half.

When the payoff finally arrives it's like being stabbed with a spoon - blunt and annoying. Ibanez has talent and shows promise as a first time director but seems bored by the plot and the need to keep the thriller almost family friendly so overkills on the visuals. However, the film is worth seeing for Elena Anaya alone, this is her 90 minutes to shine and she holds the audience enthralled. She almost makes me want to take at least a day trip to El Hierro. Almost.