The Other Way Around – a couple’s attempt to celebrate ending well (Belfast Film Festival at Queen’s Film Theatre) #BFF24

Belfast Film Festival certainly had its fair share of surreal and absurd movies this year. The final screening I attended was Spanish director Jonás Trueba’s The Other Way Round.

An actor and a director have decided to part company after 14 years together. The decision is amicable. There’s no stated cause. And they want to end well. In fact, inspired by her father’s view that separation should be celebrated with a party, they talk themselves into organising a shindig to which they’ll invite their friends and maybe even their families to mark this pivotal moment in their lives.

In the home full of Billy bookcases, there are scenes of sorting through and boxing up books and CDs as the couple split their possessions. One may stay in their apartment while the other rents a small flat: a decision-making process that becomes another point of stress that must be overcome. Splitting up is also the theme of the dialogue in a self-tape audition that Alex asks Ale to film.

“I’ve always though it’s a good idea for a film … but in real life I don’t know.”

Itsaso Arana plays the Ale, a director who is in the final stages of editing her new film. The Other Way Round becomes quite meta with husband Alex (Vito Sanz) the lead actor, and his scenes – and the aspects of the storyline we see – impossible to distinguish from real life events.

Ale is examining the process of breaking up from both sides of the lens. The film-within-a-film device works to the film’s advantage, allowing lots of on-screen commentary about whether the narrative is linear or circular, and creating the opportunity for some fun editing techniques to play with the storytelling. Ale’s father also places a copy of Søren Kierkegaard book Repetition into the hands of his daughter. The concepts of recollection and repetition and reconnecting were already frequent responses from the couple’s friends upon being informed about their breakup: “sure you’ll soon be back together”.

The Other Way Round is a sweet and thoughtful consideration of separation. Ending well and doing so in an attitude of grace and amicability seems rare but is surely a worthy ambition. Oddly, the film is never moving, and doesn’t even seem to attempt to elicit that kind of reaction. There’s an irritating sense of inevitability about the conclusion. Yet the credits will keep you glued to your seat as you watch the montage of faces at the party, people that have been incredibly important to Ale and Alex over the years.

Screened in Queen’s Film Theatre as part of the 2024 Belfast Film Festival.

 

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