Without Blood (2024) Movie Script
1
[whoosh]
[upbeat music]
[light bulb buzzes]
[insects chirping]
[soft music]
[horse huffing]
[swing rattling]
[wind howling]
[muted]
[vehicle approaching]
[lock clicks]
Alejandro.
Alejandro!
[whispers]
[door closes]
[sighs]
[floor thuds]
[tense music]
Go and hide.
Don't come out, don't make
a sound, don't do anything.
Go.
[panting]
[gunshots]
[grunts softly]
[Tito] Put down the gun
and don't move.
Put it down!
-Everything is--
-[gunshots]
Salinas, I got him! Don't...
[groans]
[footsteps]
[groans]
[piano plays]
We meet again, doctor.
Three hundred kilometers
to come down here.
It's a long way.
[Roca]
What do you want, Salinas?
The war is over.
The winner decides
when the war is over.
[Roca]
The war is over, that's it.
Not yours, doctor.
And not mine.
You'd better not touch me.
You'll be caught
and you spend the rest
of your life rotting in prison.
Do you like the idea of
growing old behind bars?
Do you?
Gurre?
-Eh?
-[chuckles]
You're mad.
Maybe, yeah.
You wanna say it again.
We'd love to hear you
talk about madmen, doctor.
Go fuck yourself.
[sighs]
Do you know
how many times I fire a shot
in four years of war?
Twice.
I don't like to shoot.
I don't like weapons.
I've never wanted to carry one.
I fought my war
sitting at my desk.
Salinas, the Rat.
Do you remember?
Yeah, that's how
your friends called me.
And you know what happened?
I screwed them, one by one.
I deciphered
their coded messages
and I put my spies on them.
And I screwed them.
And it went like that
for four years.
But the truth is that
I only fired twice.
The first one was at night.
I shot into the darkness
at no one.
The second one...
...it was the last day
of the war.
I shot my brother.
[horse neighs]
[horse neighs]
We went into the hospital
before the army arrived.
[man groans]
You had fled.
You saw which way
the wind was blowing,
so you took off
your jailers' shirts and run.
But you know what
I've remember most?
You couldn't hear a complaint.
Not a sound, doctor. Nothing.
Absolute silence.
You had reduced them
to state where
they wanted to die.
And I found my brother.
[light gasping]
Miguel...
Miguelito.
Hey, do you hear me?
That voice...
...that voice seemed
to come from hell.
[murmuring]
[raspily] Kill me...
Kill me...
[whimpering]
And I felt the bones
of my brother's face.
My own brother.
[crying]
One cannot ask a man
to do such a thing.
You couldn't ask it of me.
Ah!
I couldn't help it,
I was still screaming,
but as if from a distance.
Look at me, Roca.
Hey, I said look at me.
In the whole war,
I just fired twice.
And I will shoot one time more,
and this will be the last one.
I've nothing to do with it.
-You've nothing to do with it?
-I had nothing to do
with that hospital.
-You were there!
-I wasn't there.
-What the fuck are you saying?
-I swear it!
-You were there,
that was your hospital!
-My hospital?
You were the doctor
who was taking care of them.
-I swear to you, Salinas!
-You broke them.
You killed them.
-Shut the fuck up!
-I didn't kill anybody!
I wanna kill you!
[groans]
[moans]
[Roca's son] Go away!
Go away!
-Go away!
-No...
Who the hell is he?
[Gurre] It's the son.
What the hell you mean?
It's the son. The Roca's son.
There wasn't supposed to be
anyone here.
You said
there wasn't anyone here!
Please.
Listen to me,
don't do anything stupid.
Put that gun down.
Okay...
Please. Please...
Now you know what sort of man
your father is.
Now you know that
he is an assassin.
Murdered dozens of people.
Yeah, sometimes
he poisoned them,
little by little,
with his medicine.
Others he killed
by cutting open their chests
and then leaving them to die.
Your father was called
"The Hyena." Did you know that?
It was his friends
who called him "The Hyena"
and would laugh
when they said it.
At the end,
things were like that, boy.
Now it's too late,
even with the gun in your hand.
Don't, please.
Leave him alone, please.
Please.
-Don't do anything stupid.
-He is my father.
[yelling]
No! No!
[continues shouting]
No!
[crying continues]
Shh.
Make him stop.
[moaning continues]
Make him stop, please.
Make him stop.
Ow.
[gunshot]
[groans]
[groans]
Salinas, we have a boy,
where is the girl?
Roca has two sons, one was here,
where's the girl?
Find the girl! Find the girl!
[floor creaks]
[somber music]
-What the hell did you do?
-Hey.
-What the hell did you do?
-Hey.
[yells]
What the hell did you do!
-Please!
-It's enough!
What the hell did you do!
Easy, kid! Understand?
This is the life,
this is the life, right?
[birdsong]
[chatter]
Good evening.
I'd like to buy a ticket.
Have you been
waiting a long time?
No, why?
Nothing, ex-- excuse me. Um...
No, I want that one.
-This one, from here?
-Yes.
It's a good number.
How do you know?
It's my job.
Listen...
I was wondering if you would
like to come
and have a drink with me.
Me?
Yes.
I...
c-- I-I can't, I-I...
I have to keep the kiosk open;
I can't go now,
I don't have anyone that--
I can't.
Come with me.
Please.
Come with me.
[soft music]
[indistinct chattering]
When people win the lottery,
they can't keep the secret.
No?
The funny thing is that
the first person they tell
is a child.
Maybe there is
a moral to that...
but I've never been able
to figure out what it is.
Some stories are meant
to have a moral,
that's why they exist.
To say something profound.
Some, maybe are just stories.
I know who you are.
And I know why you've come.
Many years ago,
you saw three men
kill your father, in cold blood.
I'm the only one of those three
who's still alive.
You've come here to find me.
Now you've found me.
[exhales]
When I was a little girl
my name was Nina.
But everything ended that day.
The day my father
and my brother were killed.
I liked it.
Nina.
[bell tolling]
One day, a man
named Ricardo Uribe
came and took me with him.
He was a pharmacist.
He told everybody that
I was his daughter.
Everyone believed him.
He kept me in the back
of the pharmacy.
[indistinct]
At night, he would
sit on the sofa...
[indistinct]
...and put my hand on his lap.
[indistinct]
He'd tell me scary stories
about the war.
Then he would kiss me
on the forehead...
and let me go to sleep.
One winter evening,
he went to the Riviera.
[indistinct chattering]
[chuckles]
[Nina] At some point,
there was only him
and the Count of Torrelavid.
[cackles]
[Nina]
Then they reach that point
when gamblers
lose all sights of reality.
[chuckles]
-Do you gamble?
-No.
[Nina]
Then you won't understand.
Belsito was
the most beautiful hacienda
in the land.
You can always
bet your pharmacy.
[laughs]
You have a lovely daughter,
though.
Belsito against your daughter.
It's an honest offer.
[Nina] All eyes on him...
he couldn't think.
He just stared at his cards,
without touching them.
[sighs]
[engine starts]
The Count came to get me
first thing next morning.
[chuckles]
And then he did something
so unexpected.
He waited
until I was 14
and then he married me.
[tense music]
I gave him three sons.
[waiter] Yes?
Could we please have some tea?
[waiter] Of course, right away.
Men are so hard to understand.
The Count had only seen me
once before that day.
And he asked someone there:
"Who is that girl?"
And they told him.
I'm sorry, you have, um...
an odd way of speaking
about this.
As if...
it didn't matter to you.
On the contrary.
Everything matters too much.
I feel nostalgic
about everything
that has happened to me.
[Tito] Thank you.
[indistinct chattering]
[exhales sharply]
Is it true that
they called you Tito?
Did you ever meet my father
before that day?
I knew who he was.
Is it true that you were
the first one to shoot him?
[Roca groans]
What do you remember?
Do you remember?
I've done nothing else
for a long time,
but remember everything.
At first, obviously, I...
didn't say anything
because I was afraid.
But time passed,
and no one thought
about the war anymore.
However...
at a certain point,
we heard that Roca's daughter
was alive.
She was hidden in some village
in the south.
I didn't know what to think.
It seemed incredible
that she had come out
of that inferno alive.
But with children,
you can never say.
Finally, someone saw the girl...
and swore it was really her.
So I realized,
I would never
be free of that day.
Neither I nor the others.
Naturally,
I, I, I began to ask myself
what she might have seen
and heard.
And if she could
remember my face.
[snickers]
Who knows what happens
in the mind of a child,
confronted
by something like that.
Adults have a memory,
and a sense of justice,
and often a taste for revenge.
But a child?
I, I convinced myself that
nothing would happen.
[sighs]
But then...
[groans]
[coughing]
Salinas died...
No. [groans]
...in that strange way.
[door opens]
[man] Good day, doctor.
-You know Salinas?
-[Tito] It came out
something was off
with his medication.
It might have been
a coincidence,
but it certainly it was odd.
Everyone was persuaded
that the child knew something.
That she had something
to do with it.
It's hard to
understand now, but...
those were strange times.
The country was going forward,
beyond the war,
at an incredible speed.
But there was a whole world
that had never emerged
from that war,
and was not able to fit in
with that happy land.
I was one of those.
We all were.
For us, nothing had ended.
And that child was a danger.
So it was decided that somehow
the child should be eliminated.
It seems...
to be madness...
but in reality, it was,
it was all very logical.
She had to be eliminated.
And they charged
the Count to do it.
Yeah.
The Count of Torrelavid.
[car door closes]
He was a man who had been
a double agent
for the entire war.
He worked for them,
but he was one of us.
He came to Uribe and asked him
if he would rather spend
his life in jail
for the murder of Salinas
or vanish into nothing
and leave the kid with him.
Uribe was a coward.
He left the child to the Count.
And fled.
He died ten years later,
in a godforsaken village
on the other side of the border.
He left a note saying
he had done nothing...
and that God would follow
his enemies
to the gates of hell.
Everyone expected that
the Count...
would have her killed.
But he didn't.
He kept her with him,
in his home.
And then finally, he said,
don't worry about the girl.
For months, no one talked
about anything else
around there.
Then, later on,
everyone forgot about that.
She grew up and bore the Count
three sons.
No one ever saw her around.
[indistinct chatter]
[excited chatter]
They called her Doa Sol.
Doa Sol.
[gunshots]
Something odd was
said about her.
That she didn't speak.
No one ever heard her
say a word.
They taught it was an illness.
[shouting]
Without knowing why...
...people were afraid of her.
[door jingles]
[indistinct chatter]
[waiter] Good evening, Sir.
Excuse me.
May I get you anything
for dinner?
I am not hungry, thank you.
Please let me invite you.
[Tito] I am really not hungry.
Thank you.
-We'll have a dessert, please.
-[waiter] My pleasure.
It's a nice place.
Yes, yes.
Did your friends tell you
all those stories?
Yes.
And you believe them?
Yes.
Tell me the rest.
-What's the point?
-Do it, please.
It's not my story, it's yours.
You know it better than I do.
But I wanna hear it from you.
[horse neighs]
Many years had passed.
I was able to sleep at night
and around me,
there were people
who didn't call me Tito.
I didn't even remember
the train ride.
Moving with feeling,
without thinking.
[man] Seor.
He offered me a drink.
I asked if he'd remember me.
He knew who I was.
I wanted to ask.
I wanted to know.
We spoke a little about work...
and even politics...
and then I mentioned you.
Thanks for coming.
I understood.
Then I stood up and left.
He had a young boy
take me to the station.
I remember because
he couldn't have been
more than 14,
yet they let him drive the car.
[Nina] Carlos.
My oldest son. Carlos.
Before I left Belsito...
as I was walking down
the long hallway...
with all those closed doors...
I thought somewhere
in this house,
you were there.
I would like to have seen you.
I would have had nothing
to say to you,
but I would have liked
to seen your face.
After so many years.
For a second,
I was absolutely certain
that you would have come
out of there,
and pass by me,
without saying a word.
But nothing happened.
Because life is never complete.
There is always a piece missing.
[applause in background]
[music and laughter]
People look at us sitting here,
together.
They could think
you're my brother.
Maybe they wonder if,
if we're lovers.
Or perhaps they just think
we're a normal couple.
What else do you know about me?
Some ten years later
the Count died
in a car accident.
And you were left
with the three kids,
Belsito, and everything.
But the relatives
didn't like it.
So they said that you were mad
and you couldn't be left alone
with the three boys.
So finally they took
the case to court,
and the judge concluded
that they were right.
They took you away
from Belsito...
and they handed you over
to the doctors.
in a sanatorium in Santander.
Is that right?
[soft music]
[clinking]
[indistinct chattering]
[panting]
[moaning]
[doctor] Bring the electroshock.
-[groaning]
-[electricity buzzing]
A couple of years later,
you escaped...
and disappeared.
They looked for you for a while
but then they stopped.
They were convinced
you were dead.
A lot of crazy people disappear.
Do you have children?
-No.
-Why?
One has to have faith
in the world to have children.
Must be nice to be able
to make choices like that.
Those years, I was still
working on, in a factory.
Up in the north.
I thought nothing.
It struck me,
that business
about your going mad...
And I was wondering...
what sort of madness it was.
Maybe you were just
wandering around that place
screaming,
or maybe just...
seated there,
silent in a corner,
maybe holding a piece of rope
in your hands or
the head of a robin.
[chuckles]
The idea one has
of crazy people...
is ludicrous.
Yes.
If one doesn't know them.
Four years later...
El Gurre died.
He was found shot in the back...
in front of his stable.
They found a note.
With a name of a woman
written on it.
Yours.
From that day...
I began to expect you.
I knew nothing would stop you...
and that you would come
to see me as well.
I know you wouldn't
shoot me in the back
or send someone to kill me
who didn't even know me.
You would come
and look me in the face.
Maybe talk to me a little.
Because it was me who opened
that trapdoor that day,
and then closed it.
And you would never forget it.
I have kept this secret...
my whole life.
Like a disease.
I earned my right to be
sitting here with you.
[indistinct chattering]
[glasses clink]
Uribe...
picked up the Count's cards
and then let them slide
through his fingers slowly,
revealing them one by one.
Then he got up...
and said goodbye to
the company, politely.
Nobody laughed,
no one said a word.
Uribe didn't realize
in that moment
what he was losing,
but he certainly realized
what he was not winning.
I wasn't worth much to him.
Now, you tell me...
how is the story less true
than the story you tell?
My father...
was a wonderful father.
He was a wonderful man.
Whether you believe it or not...
why should my truth be
less true than your story?
You know I know everything
that happened that day...
and I remember so little.
But I heard something,
but what I heard was
so absurd, it was...
like a dream.
[fire crackles]
It all vanished in that fire.
But this is what I know:
you came into my house,
you fired at my father,
then Salinas shot him,
then finally El Gurre...
stuck the machine gun
in my father's mouth...
and blew his head off.
How do I know this?
Qutame la vida!
El Gurre told me.
He enjoyed bragging about it.
He was an animal. You all were.
Men are all animals at war.
Stop it.
How can God forgive you?
Stop it.
Look at you! Look at yourself,
you seem like a normal man,
with your worn out coat,
and when you take
your glasses off,
you fold them carefully
into their brown case.
The curtains
of your kiosk are clean.
And when you're gonna
cross the street,
you carefully look
to the right and left,
like a normal man.
Yet you saw my brother die
for no reason.
Just a child.
A burst of gunpowder...
and he was gone.
And you stood there
and you did nothing.
You were 17,
you were not a crippled man.
You let that happen
because that happened,
that was not some
feverish nightmare.
Please, can you explain to me
how can that be possible?
-We were fighting a war.
-What war? The war was over.
No, you don't know anything.
Then tell me what I don't know.
We believed in a better world.
What? What does that mean?
A just world.
Where the weak
don't have to suffer
for the evil of the others.
Where everybody has
the right to happiness.
And you believed that?
Of course I believed it,
we all believed it.
We had to do it and we knew how.
[gunshots]
Does that sound strange to you?
Yes.
Well, we knew. And we did it.
You can't sow
without plowing first.
You have to break up the earth.
You can't dream
of a better world
and think that it will be
delivered to you
just because you ask for it.
You have to fight for it.
Well, once you understood that,
you no longer
made any difference
if they were children
or women or old people.
We knew that
however great the price...
the reward would be immense,
because we were not
fighting for money,
or a field to work, or a flag.
We were doing it
for a better world.
We were restoring to millions
of men a decent life,
and the possibility
of happiness,
of living and, and,
and dying with dignity.
What is a boy dying
against a wall,
or ten boys or hundred?
Millions of other children
were waiting for us to do it
and we did.
-Do you really believe this?
-Why shouldn't I?
Because you won the war...
and does this seem like
a better world to you?
[sighs]
I...
...never asked myself that.
That's not true.
You have asked yourself
this question a thousand times,
you're just
afraid of the answer.
Just as you have asked yourself
a thousand times
what were you doing
in my house that day,
killing a man in cold blood,
a man who you had
never even met before.
How come he didn't get
the right to a trial?
Because you had already
started murdering
and you just were
uncapable to stop.
And in all this time,
this better world
is spinning in your head,
so that you don't have to
think about
all the other people
you murdered.
Revenge, that's why you killed.
That's why we all kill.
-That is not true.
-There shouldn't be
any shame in it.
Because it is the only drug
for the pain.
It's the only one thing
that can keep you
from going mad,
is the drug that
allows us to fight.
But did it free you?
No.
It burnt your life.
It filled you with ghosts.
You no longer even remember
what life is.
What do you know about it?
Right, I'm just a crazy woman...
who doesn't know
anything about life.
A child
who doesn't understand anything.
You don't understand.
But I'm too tired to
explain anything to you.
Do whatever you have to do,
just leave me in peace.
[sighs]
When I saw the trapdoor lift...
I felt delight and...
I turned...
...and I saw your face
as a young boy.
Somehow it felt natural.
I liked it,
that it was that boy
who came to get me.
But then you closed the door.
[trapdoor closes]
The darkness that returned,
the sound of the footsteps
of the boy
growing distant.
I felt lost.
And that horror never left me.
From that moment on...
all I ever wished for
was for that boy
to come back for me.
[sobbing]
I am sorry.
I'm so sorry.
[sighs]
Pick a hotel.
Pick one that you like
that is quiet.
[sighs]
[Nina] However incomprehensible
life is, we move through it,
with the single desire
to return to the hell
that created us.
Nothing is stronger
than the instinct
to return to where
they broke us
and to replicate
that moment forever.
But suddenly merciful
and without blood.
["If It Be You Will"
by Leonard Cohen]
If it be your will
That I speak no more
And my voice be still
As it was before
I will speak no more
I shall abide until
I am spoken for
If it be your will
If it be your will
That a voice be true
From this broken hill
I will sing to you
From this broken hill
All your praises
They shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
From this broken hill
All your praises
They shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
If it be your will
If there is a choice
Let the rivers fill
Let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these
Burning hearts in hell
If it be your will
To make us well
And to draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light
In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will
If it be your will
[soft music]
[whoosh]
[upbeat music]
[light bulb buzzes]
[insects chirping]
[soft music]
[horse huffing]
[swing rattling]
[wind howling]
[muted]
[vehicle approaching]
[lock clicks]
Alejandro.
Alejandro!
[whispers]
[door closes]
[sighs]
[floor thuds]
[tense music]
Go and hide.
Don't come out, don't make
a sound, don't do anything.
Go.
[panting]
[gunshots]
[grunts softly]
[Tito] Put down the gun
and don't move.
Put it down!
-Everything is--
-[gunshots]
Salinas, I got him! Don't...
[groans]
[footsteps]
[groans]
[piano plays]
We meet again, doctor.
Three hundred kilometers
to come down here.
It's a long way.
[Roca]
What do you want, Salinas?
The war is over.
The winner decides
when the war is over.
[Roca]
The war is over, that's it.
Not yours, doctor.
And not mine.
You'd better not touch me.
You'll be caught
and you spend the rest
of your life rotting in prison.
Do you like the idea of
growing old behind bars?
Do you?
Gurre?
-Eh?
-[chuckles]
You're mad.
Maybe, yeah.
You wanna say it again.
We'd love to hear you
talk about madmen, doctor.
Go fuck yourself.
[sighs]
Do you know
how many times I fire a shot
in four years of war?
Twice.
I don't like to shoot.
I don't like weapons.
I've never wanted to carry one.
I fought my war
sitting at my desk.
Salinas, the Rat.
Do you remember?
Yeah, that's how
your friends called me.
And you know what happened?
I screwed them, one by one.
I deciphered
their coded messages
and I put my spies on them.
And I screwed them.
And it went like that
for four years.
But the truth is that
I only fired twice.
The first one was at night.
I shot into the darkness
at no one.
The second one...
...it was the last day
of the war.
I shot my brother.
[horse neighs]
[horse neighs]
We went into the hospital
before the army arrived.
[man groans]
You had fled.
You saw which way
the wind was blowing,
so you took off
your jailers' shirts and run.
But you know what
I've remember most?
You couldn't hear a complaint.
Not a sound, doctor. Nothing.
Absolute silence.
You had reduced them
to state where
they wanted to die.
And I found my brother.
[light gasping]
Miguel...
Miguelito.
Hey, do you hear me?
That voice...
...that voice seemed
to come from hell.
[murmuring]
[raspily] Kill me...
Kill me...
[whimpering]
And I felt the bones
of my brother's face.
My own brother.
[crying]
One cannot ask a man
to do such a thing.
You couldn't ask it of me.
Ah!
I couldn't help it,
I was still screaming,
but as if from a distance.
Look at me, Roca.
Hey, I said look at me.
In the whole war,
I just fired twice.
And I will shoot one time more,
and this will be the last one.
I've nothing to do with it.
-You've nothing to do with it?
-I had nothing to do
with that hospital.
-You were there!
-I wasn't there.
-What the fuck are you saying?
-I swear it!
-You were there,
that was your hospital!
-My hospital?
You were the doctor
who was taking care of them.
-I swear to you, Salinas!
-You broke them.
You killed them.
-Shut the fuck up!
-I didn't kill anybody!
I wanna kill you!
[groans]
[moans]
[Roca's son] Go away!
Go away!
-Go away!
-No...
Who the hell is he?
[Gurre] It's the son.
What the hell you mean?
It's the son. The Roca's son.
There wasn't supposed to be
anyone here.
You said
there wasn't anyone here!
Please.
Listen to me,
don't do anything stupid.
Put that gun down.
Okay...
Please. Please...
Now you know what sort of man
your father is.
Now you know that
he is an assassin.
Murdered dozens of people.
Yeah, sometimes
he poisoned them,
little by little,
with his medicine.
Others he killed
by cutting open their chests
and then leaving them to die.
Your father was called
"The Hyena." Did you know that?
It was his friends
who called him "The Hyena"
and would laugh
when they said it.
At the end,
things were like that, boy.
Now it's too late,
even with the gun in your hand.
Don't, please.
Leave him alone, please.
Please.
-Don't do anything stupid.
-He is my father.
[yelling]
No! No!
[continues shouting]
No!
[crying continues]
Shh.
Make him stop.
[moaning continues]
Make him stop, please.
Make him stop.
Ow.
[gunshot]
[groans]
[groans]
Salinas, we have a boy,
where is the girl?
Roca has two sons, one was here,
where's the girl?
Find the girl! Find the girl!
[floor creaks]
[somber music]
-What the hell did you do?
-Hey.
-What the hell did you do?
-Hey.
[yells]
What the hell did you do!
-Please!
-It's enough!
What the hell did you do!
Easy, kid! Understand?
This is the life,
this is the life, right?
[birdsong]
[chatter]
Good evening.
I'd like to buy a ticket.
Have you been
waiting a long time?
No, why?
Nothing, ex-- excuse me. Um...
No, I want that one.
-This one, from here?
-Yes.
It's a good number.
How do you know?
It's my job.
Listen...
I was wondering if you would
like to come
and have a drink with me.
Me?
Yes.
I...
c-- I-I can't, I-I...
I have to keep the kiosk open;
I can't go now,
I don't have anyone that--
I can't.
Come with me.
Please.
Come with me.
[soft music]
[indistinct chattering]
When people win the lottery,
they can't keep the secret.
No?
The funny thing is that
the first person they tell
is a child.
Maybe there is
a moral to that...
but I've never been able
to figure out what it is.
Some stories are meant
to have a moral,
that's why they exist.
To say something profound.
Some, maybe are just stories.
I know who you are.
And I know why you've come.
Many years ago,
you saw three men
kill your father, in cold blood.
I'm the only one of those three
who's still alive.
You've come here to find me.
Now you've found me.
[exhales]
When I was a little girl
my name was Nina.
But everything ended that day.
The day my father
and my brother were killed.
I liked it.
Nina.
[bell tolling]
One day, a man
named Ricardo Uribe
came and took me with him.
He was a pharmacist.
He told everybody that
I was his daughter.
Everyone believed him.
He kept me in the back
of the pharmacy.
[indistinct]
At night, he would
sit on the sofa...
[indistinct]
...and put my hand on his lap.
[indistinct]
He'd tell me scary stories
about the war.
Then he would kiss me
on the forehead...
and let me go to sleep.
One winter evening,
he went to the Riviera.
[indistinct chattering]
[chuckles]
[Nina] At some point,
there was only him
and the Count of Torrelavid.
[cackles]
[Nina]
Then they reach that point
when gamblers
lose all sights of reality.
[chuckles]
-Do you gamble?
-No.
[Nina]
Then you won't understand.
Belsito was
the most beautiful hacienda
in the land.
You can always
bet your pharmacy.
[laughs]
You have a lovely daughter,
though.
Belsito against your daughter.
It's an honest offer.
[Nina] All eyes on him...
he couldn't think.
He just stared at his cards,
without touching them.
[sighs]
[engine starts]
The Count came to get me
first thing next morning.
[chuckles]
And then he did something
so unexpected.
He waited
until I was 14
and then he married me.
[tense music]
I gave him three sons.
[waiter] Yes?
Could we please have some tea?
[waiter] Of course, right away.
Men are so hard to understand.
The Count had only seen me
once before that day.
And he asked someone there:
"Who is that girl?"
And they told him.
I'm sorry, you have, um...
an odd way of speaking
about this.
As if...
it didn't matter to you.
On the contrary.
Everything matters too much.
I feel nostalgic
about everything
that has happened to me.
[Tito] Thank you.
[indistinct chattering]
[exhales sharply]
Is it true that
they called you Tito?
Did you ever meet my father
before that day?
I knew who he was.
Is it true that you were
the first one to shoot him?
[Roca groans]
What do you remember?
Do you remember?
I've done nothing else
for a long time,
but remember everything.
At first, obviously, I...
didn't say anything
because I was afraid.
But time passed,
and no one thought
about the war anymore.
However...
at a certain point,
we heard that Roca's daughter
was alive.
She was hidden in some village
in the south.
I didn't know what to think.
It seemed incredible
that she had come out
of that inferno alive.
But with children,
you can never say.
Finally, someone saw the girl...
and swore it was really her.
So I realized,
I would never
be free of that day.
Neither I nor the others.
Naturally,
I, I, I began to ask myself
what she might have seen
and heard.
And if she could
remember my face.
[snickers]
Who knows what happens
in the mind of a child,
confronted
by something like that.
Adults have a memory,
and a sense of justice,
and often a taste for revenge.
But a child?
I, I convinced myself that
nothing would happen.
[sighs]
But then...
[groans]
[coughing]
Salinas died...
No. [groans]
...in that strange way.
[door opens]
[man] Good day, doctor.
-You know Salinas?
-[Tito] It came out
something was off
with his medication.
It might have been
a coincidence,
but it certainly it was odd.
Everyone was persuaded
that the child knew something.
That she had something
to do with it.
It's hard to
understand now, but...
those were strange times.
The country was going forward,
beyond the war,
at an incredible speed.
But there was a whole world
that had never emerged
from that war,
and was not able to fit in
with that happy land.
I was one of those.
We all were.
For us, nothing had ended.
And that child was a danger.
So it was decided that somehow
the child should be eliminated.
It seems...
to be madness...
but in reality, it was,
it was all very logical.
She had to be eliminated.
And they charged
the Count to do it.
Yeah.
The Count of Torrelavid.
[car door closes]
He was a man who had been
a double agent
for the entire war.
He worked for them,
but he was one of us.
He came to Uribe and asked him
if he would rather spend
his life in jail
for the murder of Salinas
or vanish into nothing
and leave the kid with him.
Uribe was a coward.
He left the child to the Count.
And fled.
He died ten years later,
in a godforsaken village
on the other side of the border.
He left a note saying
he had done nothing...
and that God would follow
his enemies
to the gates of hell.
Everyone expected that
the Count...
would have her killed.
But he didn't.
He kept her with him,
in his home.
And then finally, he said,
don't worry about the girl.
For months, no one talked
about anything else
around there.
Then, later on,
everyone forgot about that.
She grew up and bore the Count
three sons.
No one ever saw her around.
[indistinct chatter]
[excited chatter]
They called her Doa Sol.
Doa Sol.
[gunshots]
Something odd was
said about her.
That she didn't speak.
No one ever heard her
say a word.
They taught it was an illness.
[shouting]
Without knowing why...
...people were afraid of her.
[door jingles]
[indistinct chatter]
[waiter] Good evening, Sir.
Excuse me.
May I get you anything
for dinner?
I am not hungry, thank you.
Please let me invite you.
[Tito] I am really not hungry.
Thank you.
-We'll have a dessert, please.
-[waiter] My pleasure.
It's a nice place.
Yes, yes.
Did your friends tell you
all those stories?
Yes.
And you believe them?
Yes.
Tell me the rest.
-What's the point?
-Do it, please.
It's not my story, it's yours.
You know it better than I do.
But I wanna hear it from you.
[horse neighs]
Many years had passed.
I was able to sleep at night
and around me,
there were people
who didn't call me Tito.
I didn't even remember
the train ride.
Moving with feeling,
without thinking.
[man] Seor.
He offered me a drink.
I asked if he'd remember me.
He knew who I was.
I wanted to ask.
I wanted to know.
We spoke a little about work...
and even politics...
and then I mentioned you.
Thanks for coming.
I understood.
Then I stood up and left.
He had a young boy
take me to the station.
I remember because
he couldn't have been
more than 14,
yet they let him drive the car.
[Nina] Carlos.
My oldest son. Carlos.
Before I left Belsito...
as I was walking down
the long hallway...
with all those closed doors...
I thought somewhere
in this house,
you were there.
I would like to have seen you.
I would have had nothing
to say to you,
but I would have liked
to seen your face.
After so many years.
For a second,
I was absolutely certain
that you would have come
out of there,
and pass by me,
without saying a word.
But nothing happened.
Because life is never complete.
There is always a piece missing.
[applause in background]
[music and laughter]
People look at us sitting here,
together.
They could think
you're my brother.
Maybe they wonder if,
if we're lovers.
Or perhaps they just think
we're a normal couple.
What else do you know about me?
Some ten years later
the Count died
in a car accident.
And you were left
with the three kids,
Belsito, and everything.
But the relatives
didn't like it.
So they said that you were mad
and you couldn't be left alone
with the three boys.
So finally they took
the case to court,
and the judge concluded
that they were right.
They took you away
from Belsito...
and they handed you over
to the doctors.
in a sanatorium in Santander.
Is that right?
[soft music]
[clinking]
[indistinct chattering]
[panting]
[moaning]
[doctor] Bring the electroshock.
-[groaning]
-[electricity buzzing]
A couple of years later,
you escaped...
and disappeared.
They looked for you for a while
but then they stopped.
They were convinced
you were dead.
A lot of crazy people disappear.
Do you have children?
-No.
-Why?
One has to have faith
in the world to have children.
Must be nice to be able
to make choices like that.
Those years, I was still
working on, in a factory.
Up in the north.
I thought nothing.
It struck me,
that business
about your going mad...
And I was wondering...
what sort of madness it was.
Maybe you were just
wandering around that place
screaming,
or maybe just...
seated there,
silent in a corner,
maybe holding a piece of rope
in your hands or
the head of a robin.
[chuckles]
The idea one has
of crazy people...
is ludicrous.
Yes.
If one doesn't know them.
Four years later...
El Gurre died.
He was found shot in the back...
in front of his stable.
They found a note.
With a name of a woman
written on it.
Yours.
From that day...
I began to expect you.
I knew nothing would stop you...
and that you would come
to see me as well.
I know you wouldn't
shoot me in the back
or send someone to kill me
who didn't even know me.
You would come
and look me in the face.
Maybe talk to me a little.
Because it was me who opened
that trapdoor that day,
and then closed it.
And you would never forget it.
I have kept this secret...
my whole life.
Like a disease.
I earned my right to be
sitting here with you.
[indistinct chattering]
[glasses clink]
Uribe...
picked up the Count's cards
and then let them slide
through his fingers slowly,
revealing them one by one.
Then he got up...
and said goodbye to
the company, politely.
Nobody laughed,
no one said a word.
Uribe didn't realize
in that moment
what he was losing,
but he certainly realized
what he was not winning.
I wasn't worth much to him.
Now, you tell me...
how is the story less true
than the story you tell?
My father...
was a wonderful father.
He was a wonderful man.
Whether you believe it or not...
why should my truth be
less true than your story?
You know I know everything
that happened that day...
and I remember so little.
But I heard something,
but what I heard was
so absurd, it was...
like a dream.
[fire crackles]
It all vanished in that fire.
But this is what I know:
you came into my house,
you fired at my father,
then Salinas shot him,
then finally El Gurre...
stuck the machine gun
in my father's mouth...
and blew his head off.
How do I know this?
Qutame la vida!
El Gurre told me.
He enjoyed bragging about it.
He was an animal. You all were.
Men are all animals at war.
Stop it.
How can God forgive you?
Stop it.
Look at you! Look at yourself,
you seem like a normal man,
with your worn out coat,
and when you take
your glasses off,
you fold them carefully
into their brown case.
The curtains
of your kiosk are clean.
And when you're gonna
cross the street,
you carefully look
to the right and left,
like a normal man.
Yet you saw my brother die
for no reason.
Just a child.
A burst of gunpowder...
and he was gone.
And you stood there
and you did nothing.
You were 17,
you were not a crippled man.
You let that happen
because that happened,
that was not some
feverish nightmare.
Please, can you explain to me
how can that be possible?
-We were fighting a war.
-What war? The war was over.
No, you don't know anything.
Then tell me what I don't know.
We believed in a better world.
What? What does that mean?
A just world.
Where the weak
don't have to suffer
for the evil of the others.
Where everybody has
the right to happiness.
And you believed that?
Of course I believed it,
we all believed it.
We had to do it and we knew how.
[gunshots]
Does that sound strange to you?
Yes.
Well, we knew. And we did it.
You can't sow
without plowing first.
You have to break up the earth.
You can't dream
of a better world
and think that it will be
delivered to you
just because you ask for it.
You have to fight for it.
Well, once you understood that,
you no longer
made any difference
if they were children
or women or old people.
We knew that
however great the price...
the reward would be immense,
because we were not
fighting for money,
or a field to work, or a flag.
We were doing it
for a better world.
We were restoring to millions
of men a decent life,
and the possibility
of happiness,
of living and, and,
and dying with dignity.
What is a boy dying
against a wall,
or ten boys or hundred?
Millions of other children
were waiting for us to do it
and we did.
-Do you really believe this?
-Why shouldn't I?
Because you won the war...
and does this seem like
a better world to you?
[sighs]
I...
...never asked myself that.
That's not true.
You have asked yourself
this question a thousand times,
you're just
afraid of the answer.
Just as you have asked yourself
a thousand times
what were you doing
in my house that day,
killing a man in cold blood,
a man who you had
never even met before.
How come he didn't get
the right to a trial?
Because you had already
started murdering
and you just were
uncapable to stop.
And in all this time,
this better world
is spinning in your head,
so that you don't have to
think about
all the other people
you murdered.
Revenge, that's why you killed.
That's why we all kill.
-That is not true.
-There shouldn't be
any shame in it.
Because it is the only drug
for the pain.
It's the only one thing
that can keep you
from going mad,
is the drug that
allows us to fight.
But did it free you?
No.
It burnt your life.
It filled you with ghosts.
You no longer even remember
what life is.
What do you know about it?
Right, I'm just a crazy woman...
who doesn't know
anything about life.
A child
who doesn't understand anything.
You don't understand.
But I'm too tired to
explain anything to you.
Do whatever you have to do,
just leave me in peace.
[sighs]
When I saw the trapdoor lift...
I felt delight and...
I turned...
...and I saw your face
as a young boy.
Somehow it felt natural.
I liked it,
that it was that boy
who came to get me.
But then you closed the door.
[trapdoor closes]
The darkness that returned,
the sound of the footsteps
of the boy
growing distant.
I felt lost.
And that horror never left me.
From that moment on...
all I ever wished for
was for that boy
to come back for me.
[sobbing]
I am sorry.
I'm so sorry.
[sighs]
Pick a hotel.
Pick one that you like
that is quiet.
[sighs]
[Nina] However incomprehensible
life is, we move through it,
with the single desire
to return to the hell
that created us.
Nothing is stronger
than the instinct
to return to where
they broke us
and to replicate
that moment forever.
But suddenly merciful
and without blood.
["If It Be You Will"
by Leonard Cohen]
If it be your will
That I speak no more
And my voice be still
As it was before
I will speak no more
I shall abide until
I am spoken for
If it be your will
If it be your will
That a voice be true
From this broken hill
I will sing to you
From this broken hill
All your praises
They shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
From this broken hill
All your praises
They shall ring
If it be your will
To let me sing
If it be your will
If there is a choice
Let the rivers fill
Let the hills rejoice
Let your mercy spill
On all these
Burning hearts in hell
If it be your will
To make us well
And to draw us near
And bind us tight
All your children here
In their rags of light
In our rags of light
All dressed to kill
And end this night
If it be your will
If it be your will
[soft music]