Salvador Garcia Ruiz’s compelling second feature, The Other Side, charts the parallel emotional journeys of an adolescent boy who’s indirectly responsible for a man´s death, and the lawyer engaged to help him. The story opens with an uneasy encounter between the two characters, seemingly worlds apart. One is shy, 15-year-old Ramon (Jorge Alcazar), accused of killing a man, while the other is successful lawyer Marcelo (Alex Casanovas), who grew up in the same low-rent, working-class Madrid neighborhood. Assembling elements of the drama like a puzzle, the screenplay conveys only the info that is absolutely necessary to get a handle on the characters, gradually sketching in layers of detail as the story unfolds and the relationships develop.
David Rooney
