Unfolding in two parallel stories, two generations of the same Spanish family are drawn to the romance, beauty and danger of Equatorial Guinea. In 1954, strapping young Kilian (Mario Casas, in his most romantic role thus far) journeys from his Huesca home to the African island of Fernando Pó, where he falls perilously in love with Bisila (Berta Vazquez), the beautiful wife of a plantation worker.

Decades later, Kilian’s niece, Clarence (Adriana Ugarte, who plays the title role in Almodovar’s forthcoming Julieta), discovers a letter hidden among Kilian’s belongings. Clarence sets out upon her own journey to Fernando Pó (now Bioko) to retrace her uncle’s steps—and unearth a long-buried family secret. The two intertwined narratives reflect the upheavals of Equatorial Guinea itself, which declared its independence in 1968 after nearly 200 years of colonial rule, and has subsequently experienced the growing pains of any nascent nation.

This big-budget, sweeping romance, produced on the scale of Oscar-winning classics like Gone With The Wind, Out of Africa or The English Patient, is a triumph of melodrama at its most wildly sensorial. Everything is hyper-real, fiercely vivid and smoldering with passion in these years of living dangerously: the snows chill to the bone, and the palm trees sway as if swooning for the sexiness of the romantic leads. – Jaie Laplante

This film is also a part of the Lexus Ibero American Feature Film Competition.