"In this personal, original film, Saura examines the trauma from the Civil War that Spain (and he) are still coming to terms with. Luis, an introspective middle-aged businessman, travels to Segovia to bury his mother in the family crypt. This is his first return trip since some thirty years earlier when, at the outbreak of the Civil War, he was sent to stay with Falangist relatives while his father fought for the Loyalists. Triggered by familiar sights, memories of his childhood emerge--his tentative courting of his cousin Angelica, a Catholic priest terrorizing his students with an unmerciful God, his uncle beating him with a belt. When Luis and Angelica attempt to escape this repressive environment they are inevitably returned to the family; love (and Spain) are destroyed. Saura makes a strong political statement about Civil War Spain by showing the intrinsic repressiveness of Church and family from a boy's point of view. In all the flashbacks, Luis-the-child is played by Luis-the-adult. As sad-eyed Luis relives his past, Saura underscores the connection between past and present. Luis the man is an extension of Luis the child; modern Spain is inexorably linked to Spain of 1936. The continuity of time is further emphasized by the same actors playing different characters in scenes from the past and present." --Kathy Geritz