Nowhere (2023) Film Review: An Emotional Odyssey of Survival

We are usually unaware of what we are capable of, especially in dire situations, until moments come when we do things that we would even be stunned to see other people do. In such an event where you find yourself stranded in the middle of nowhere, in an ocean, will you be willing to cross boundaries to survive or wait until the inevitable comes upon you? The answer to such a question is not straightforward and depends on the circumstances of its occurrence.

The 2023 Spanish film Nowhere portrays the story of a woman who was fleeing a totalitarian country with her family—her husband and her unboarded child. In her attempt to carry out her plans, she encounters a series of happenings that threaten her life and that of her family. They get separated, and she finds herself alone with her pregnancy on her journey and gets stuck in the middle of the ocean. Survival with her child becomes mission impossible for her.

What is most important for me in a film is to truly enjoy the story and know that I indulged in something worthwhile. Anything other than that would, you know, make me feel pissed. It does happen regularly, though, that some stories don't hit right; one may just go with the flow if there are other elements of the film that seem to suffice. With this film, Nowhere, however, I gave them applause in the end.

The film starts with some kind of intriguing tension. That immediately piqued my interest and encouraged me to want to see what would happen next. What it turned out to be was something far from what I had expected. But it was alright. It was alright because I very much appreciated the fact that this story portrayed something very realistic and thought-provoking, even emotional as well.

Right off the bat and early enough, I would say that this film might not be what most people would be looking for in a movie, considering that it was not exactly the "entertaining" kind. If one is down for depth and slow-paced drama, then this may be seen in a different and interesting light.

Depth and realism are the things I appreciated the most in this film. From start to finish, I was glued to my screen, feeling every emotion in each scene, not just because the protagonist was excellent at her job but also because of the accurate depiction of what lengths we humans can go for survival—the next-level thinking we could attain in desperate moments to live.

Being stuck in an ocean for many days with zero hope of making it out alive or being rescued anytime soon does seem like the right equation for one to choose to let go and await death—and many would at some point, unless they found some other reason so important to live, like that of keeping a child alive. And so, what we had for most of the film were portrayals of different ways a person could use what they had in their environment to survive.

They were very real in this film. There are potentially disturbing sights in this film. At one point, when I saw the protagonist eat something utterly unacceptable, I was grossed out for a few seconds. But then, I still appreciated the film for doing that, amongst many others, to depict realism. Those parts were meant to portray the truth that anything can become doable to one when desperate to survive.

I have heard about whales being highly intelligent sea creatures, and I have seen them demonstrated in cartoons, but mostly in unrealistic ways—to the best of my knowledge anyway. I liked how subtle they inserted that fact about the intelligence of whales in part where a whale somehow came through for the protagonist. Intentional or not, I appreciated it.

For most of the film, I had no idea what to expect. There's nothing wrong with being able to anticipate sometimes, but it felt good to not be able to do so in most cases as the surprises showed up.

The ending of the film had such a sublime resolve to it. I mean, it was a pretty intense landing and a pretty emotional one as well, but the film landed safely. I liked that I didn't have to become vexed over yet another poorly-ended film.

Again, I would like to commend the performance of the main actress, Anna Castillo. There were not more than two main characters in this film, but it didn't feel much like it, thanks to her performance and a well-written film.

The film may have felt a tad bit overstretched to me, as my patience to see how it would end was beginning to wane. Every scene brought something sort of new, but I began to feel like a resolution should happen sooner than it was taking. Nonetheless, it was a very enjoyable film for me.

With all said here, I would put the film somewhere around 8/10. I would surely recommend it, but it is worth noting that expectations should be lowered to really appreciate this film.