“Sica” (2023) is the name of a teenage girl (Thais Garcia) who is looking for closure after a fishing ship goes missing. Even though her father’s body has not been recovered, the authorities stop searching. Her mother, Carmen (Nuria Prims), and neighbor and friend, Leda (Maria Villaverde), whose father is also missing, accept the decision and try to move on, but Sica is relentless in trying to find answers either through superstition or trying to question Julio (Toni Porras), the only member of the crew who did not go on the doomed voyage. The community’s reaction to Sica’s relentless leaves her isolated. During her trips to the coast, she crosses paths with Suso (Marco Antonio Florido), another loner who is a self-professed storm chaser. They befriend each other, but Sica discovers that Suso has limits to her pursuit for the truth, thus leaving her alone to decide how to accept the ambiguity of her loss.
The setup sounds more dynamic than “Sica” feels. It is a deliberately paced character study in a coming-of-age story where an adolescent teen matures in increments but refuses to take the steps of expected rites of passage for a teen girl. In contrast, Leda dives into the teen social world and elects to behave like a normal teenage girl. The difference in coping styles strains their friendship as Leda prioritizes conformity in exchange for acceptance and attention. Sica’s lack of interest in boys and unfashionable, practical and sentimental dressing style makes her a source of ridicule. They begin to judge each other for their choices, and this theme in the movie is the most provocative because it is counterintuitive, though common, that such an insular community would not interfere with teens tailgating. Also the general unkindness of Sica’s classmates is shocking considering the circumstances and leads to an implicit set of mores that genuine emotion must be smothered for a girl to be a part of the community.
Sica is more child than adult and is not drawn to these pastimes. She loves and misses her dad, so she adopts fisherman superstitions by frequently visiting the Furna das Grallas, a wave carved hole in the rocks, to hear her father’s voice again. Her red practical clothes symbolize her refusal to conform whereas the ocean and everyone else lean towards more tranquil or muted colors like blues and grays. Her routine consists of trying to continue her friendship with Leda, visiting the ocean, going to school, discouraging her mom from changing anything as an act of loyalty to her father, and trying to determine accessible ways for a child to investigate and uncover the truth. Her investigation leads her to discover the flaws in the people that she has known the longest. She is appalled that adults lie, and that her parents are imperfect. The ensuing disillusionment takes her to a crossroads of how she will navigate the situation.
Her mother becomes ostracized when she makes a practical decision, which exacerbates Sica’s exile. Sica has never been more alone, which is why Suso’s friendship is so welcome. He is an oddball too. He shows zero curiosity about sex and still plays by the ocean though he frames it as an interest in meteorology. He is the only one who aids her in her search with mixed results. “Sica” is not a Nancy Drew mystery or a crime drama so when Sica finds answers by eavesdropping or taking Suso’s advice, they lead to more questions that never get resolved. Who is harassing her mom and Julio? What was the purpose of the expedition? Why does Carmen distrust Suso’s family? Why do the bullies use Roadrunner as a nickname for Sica? If Sica stopped resisting, what would Mom do if they moved? Was Mom always an outsider so her husband’s death severed whatever connection Sica also had in the community as not a true local who could be traced back for generations on both sides like Leda? It is easy to guess but requires a lot of assumptions, and these details may have anchored the story more. Other than Leda and Sica, it does not feel as if these people have lived together all their lives.
Writer and director Carla Subirana is more interested in depicting how Sica’s tribulations are a microcosm of the entire community’s problems. She intersperses the drama on the surface with extended lyrical underwater and abstract nature sequences, which would be expected in a documentary, the genre of Subirana’s earlier films. The underlying catalyst for the human drama is climate change, which ties into Suso’s hobby of choice. The fishermen in town do not make enough money from their vocation, which forces them to take illicit risks to survive. So, individuals are bearing the costs of a collective problem instead of the community finding a solution and sharing the cost. Instead, it leads to infighting among neighbors and turns Sica, Carmen and Julio into pariahs instead of people who need consolation and support.
Climate change and nature also act as touchstones for the limited options available to adolescent girls. Accepted girls do not cling to nature as Sica does. By associating nature with death, Sica’s relationship with the ocean becomes oversimplified as a vortex of turbulent doom. Suso predicts a whopper of a storm on the horizon, which he names “Ophelia.” Ophelia was a character in William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” a love interest of the titular prince, who kills her father, treats her wantonly in public and pretends that he is not interested in her. Ophelia commits suicide by drowning. Subirana opens the film with Sica under water, an alarming image considering. The unspoken tension of “Sica” is whether this twenty-first century teenage girl will find an acceptable option outside of Leda and Ophelia’s choices. Will she find life in the water again?
Subirana’s feature debut is a gorgeous film that dips its toe in magical realism, which Spanish films are usually best at depicting like “The Orphanage” (2007) in comparison with films from other cultures. Sica’s father’s voice becomes a comforting presence that can appear at unexpected times. Occasionally it adheres to the town’s legends’ rules, but other times it appears like a one-sided version of “Frequency” (2000). Because it happens so infrequently, it never achieves the resonance like Guillermo del Toro’s films and is not used to tie into the Ophelia theme, the seductive nature of death to reunite with the beloved dead. Instead, by the end of “Sica,” there is a firm stance on whether the supernatural is an acceptable venue to reconnect with the deceased.
Despite being a thoughtful, meditative film willing to grapple with a child processing a parent’s death and how to move on and grow as a part of normal adolescent development, “Sica” suffers from its protagonist being the least interesting character. It is overdue that a film takes a girl seriously and explore the liminal threshold between childhood and adolescence, which Garcia performs perfectly. There are plenty of films about wives dealing with the loss of their husbands and sudden financial insecurity, but Carmen’s occasional revelations about the real quality of life before becoming a widow and her future hopes just made Sica’s story feel less urgent. There is a mysterious figure whom Suso alludes to as an option to locate her father, and at the hour mark, Sica finally meets him, The Portuguese (Lois Soaxe), and it is the most powerful moment in the film because someone is willing to give answers and challenge Suso’s assumptions. Soaxe is so riveting that when his scene is over, the loss is palpable because his strong performance creates an expectation that he will continue to play a role, but that is it.
“Sica” is a solid first feature, but not the kind of film that will make most moviegoers crave more. It is refreshing to have a director explore the flipside of coming-of-age stories like Catherine Hardwicke’s “Thirteen” (2003). The meandering realism of Subirana’s tale is poignant but is missing too many specifics to feel universally relatable and feels as if it is more in the draft or experimental stage than a final draft. While Subirana deserves credit for highlighting a global issue that affects everyone, it cannot be at the price of creating a tangible community otherwise there is a danger of it veering into an Afterschool Special or cautionary tale than a human story.
