Las vacas con gafas

An understated, yet funny, poetic and at times heartbreaking look into the life of a elderly master painter who is now slowly but surely going blind, and his attempts to repair the mistakes of his selfish past and reconnect with his daughter who wants nothing to do with him.   It would be easy for a subject matter like this to feel too bleak, too predictable or too esoteric.   But the film refuses to give in to either sentimentality or outright absurdity, instead balancing debates about high art, thoughts of suicide, neurotic feuds with pigeons as a species, and the realities of going blind all with the same unassuming but assured tone.

Every time the film seems to be heading in a certain direction, it rebels, instead demanding that life isn't that simple and redemption is never going to be easy.  This command of craft and strength of vision, consistency and cohesiveness of writing, shooting style, performance, tone and perspective right to the very final shot is the reason Las Vacas Con Gafas won the Yellow Robin Award winner of Curacao IFFR 2015.