Inheriting the Castle Review: A Fairytale Gift Turned Nightmare | Documentary

El Castillo (The Castle) is a feature-length documentary by Argentinian filmmaker Martín Benchimol that was acclaimed by the BBC for its Storyville installment in Inherit the castle perhaps in order to bring some clarity to the debates.

Benchimol discovered this castle, which is not really a castle but a huge mansion, with a Disney-style turret, by chance in the middle of the Argentine pampas while he was shooting another film, The Dread. He assumed that the indigenous woman who opened the door to him was a servant. In fact, she was the owner.

Justina started out as a domestic. The film shows her explaining to an official visiting the property that she started cleaning at the age of five. Because she was so young, she often stepped on the freshly waxed floors and re-dirtied them. The owner, a wealthy socialite whose glamorous portrait still dominates the now-crumbling walls, would yell at her, Justina recalls.

When Justina died, she received the house from her employer, in recognition of her long service and the care she gave him during his final illness. But it seems that this was on the condition that she not sell it. The film thus becomes a meditation on love, loyalty and poisoned legacies.

Justina and her daughter, Alexia (a racing car enthusiast who dreams of moving to Buenos Aires and training for Formula 4 glory), barely survive as the house falls apart. The little they earn from raising and selling a few cattle, and sometimes antiques from the house, doesn't even fund a fraction of the necessary repairs. There are holes in the ceilings, plaster is blown out everywhere, and the plumbing, including the toilet, doesn't work.

There is no voiceover, no interviews with Justina or Alexia, nothing to explain what is happening or what they are thinking. This hands-off approach works well at first, the fairytale atmosphere leaving plenty of space for the viewer to ponder this strange situation. The beautiful cinematography makes it impossible to ignore the contrast between the beauty of the landscape and the cramped lives of the women. The upkeep the castle demands and the energy it absorbs from its inhabitants are symbols of capitalism in microcosm.

But after a while, this is no longer enough. The viewer cannot live on evocation alone. The scarcity of information becomes frustrating. Questions begin to invade the work and the atmosphere of delicate melancholy is overwhelmed by the need for answers.

What does Justina gain by staying there? Did she really inherit the castle, or just the right to live there? Is she staying out of loyalty, or because the alternative is no better? Speaking of loyalty, did her employer do anything to deserve her?

Are Alexia's ambitions a dream? Is Justina right to want to keep her in the castle, or is she standing in the way of her daughter's plans? Is the man Justina is seen making numerous late-night calls with her husband, her partner, or a toxic boyfriend? Justina's life doesn't seem to be full of joy, even though she and Alexia clearly love each other. Was she undermined long before by a difficult life we're told nothing about, or is it simply the burden of old age?

Further questions arise when it appears that the former owner's relatives often come to visit, expecting Justina to serve them as she used to. They are clearly a privileged and unfriendly bunch, but it is unclear to what extent, since we do not know whether Justina's occupation is a temporary blip before their house is returned to them, or whether they are encroaching on something that absolutely belongs to her. We do not know whether the patriarchs' attempts to persuade Justina to add the house to the local tourist circuit and raise money for repairs are helpful, or whether they are a selfish attempt to keep the family pile from deteriorating beyond the point of no return.

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Reading the documentary, it seems that the family was played by Benchimols herself. Why? Do they represent real people who refused to run but whose psychological pressures have a significant influence on women? Were they invented to highlight Argentina's rigid class system and the gap between rich and poor?

Inheriting the Castle gives us no insight into Justina or Alexia's inner lives; we're lost in the woods. It's great for the fairy tale atmosphere, but not for anything else.