‘The Other Way Around’ Review – A Soul-Bearing Drama Bound To Leave A Mark [Cannes 2024]

At the filmic heart of The Other Way Around is the collective soul of the people within it, held firm by those of Ale and Alex. A surprising chunk, perhaps even an eventual majority of the runtime is dedicated to kicking the central plot mechanism into function, and it’s all about people; how they react, what they think and feel, and how what they say impacts the following scene. The mechanism, and conflict in this case, being the aforementioned couple’s decision to host what is essentially a “break-up party” to commemorate their splitting after fourteen years of being together.

The idea is spurred by Ale’s father as a way to celebrate wanting things to get better, rather than just suffering in what has become the norm. Despite Ale and Alex, our clear main characters, being convinced of the idea to the point of execution, most of those around them are skeptical. The majority of the film follows this process as it unfolds, and to be so mundane (as it sounds), the film is a deeply compelling portrait of human connection and thought.

Itsaso Arana (Ale) and Vito Sanz (Alex) steer said ruminations and all conversations herein. Their performances are carefully connected yet entirely singular all the same; Arana plays it loose, nonchalant in a way that clearly implies a discomfort and regret not far below the surface. Sanz is a bit more bare, seemingly trying to convince himself, in addition to his interlocutor, in every conversation that his and Ale’s fragmentation is a good idea. As the film advances, each half of the couple breaks the news, as well as extends party invitations, to those around them in varying manners that range between casually humorous to uncomfortably heartbreaking.

One scene in particular, in which Alex breaks the news to his mother, reigns specifically impactful in this regard. Sanz’s vulnerable performance extracts the expected emotion from the sequence in an efficient, quick manner, offering both his own nervous aura as well as his mother’s hinted, teary-eyed disapproval over the phone. The interaction is, again, quick, but when strung together with the rest of the scenes like it, it’s a refreshing shift in tone that’ll likely go down as one of the more memorable stints in the film.

To this point, The Other Way Around does suffer an odd structure, despite strong character writing and community development. The build-up to the central plot device becomes overlong after a while; you get well over halfway into the thing and begin to wonder where the checkpoint is. The film, despite expert craft the whole way through, begins to lose energy that it never fully recovers to a point.

This problem is somewhat offset, at least for a while, by director Jonás Trueba’s intimate, graceful touch at the helm. Often, Trueba will hold shots to a breaking point, stretching their purpose to the highest extreme and reserving subtle movements for right when they’re needed most. He also manages unbelievably slick displays of blocking and frame management that distract from the length of some shots too; this is a filmmaker in a comfortably quiet zone, one that suits both the tone and subject matter on hand.

This elegant simplicity boils all the way down to the opening credits and title cards; there is a calming openness about The Other Way Around that, even in the most challenging moments of emotion and decision, makes it easy to stick to.

The story is one that you’ll need to uncover yourself, but the patience with which it is told, and the properly prodding manner in which it is finished, should be worth the wait for most. This is a lovelorn, calm drama that wears an earnest mark of honesty across the face. It’s human to a fault, which also means a painstaking relatability that many may want to avoid, though that is an impossible task.

No matter what you’re going through, The Other Way Around may make you feel a little less alone, even if all the answers it purports aren’t wholly positive. Learn with this film, live with it, and come out with a sense of scarred optimism that is special to it alone. Not perfect, but perfectly unique, and understandably flawed in both purposeful and irresolute ways.

The Other Way Around held its World Premiere as a part of the Director’s Fortnight section of the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. 

Director: Jonás Trueba

Screenwriter: Jonás Trueba

Rated: NR

Runtime: 114m