Simultaneously enigmatic and visceral, the new Spanish horror film The Elderly instantly sets a dreadful atmosphere and continues to build it to a crescendo of pure terror. It's a slow-burn until it isn't, with one of the grisliest final acts in recent memory. The film begins when an elderly woman dresses herself up in order to jump out a window and take her own life. Her husband, Manuel (Zorion Eguileor, stoic and creepy), is left alone but doesn't seem particularly fazed. In fact, his indifference to death and suffering becomes increasingly disturbing as the audience asks themselves, is he insane, suffering from dementia, or something somehow more... inhuman?
Manuel's loving but struggling son, Mario (an endlessly relatable Gustavo Salmerón) takes him in, much to the chagrin of his pregnant new wife, Lena (Irene Anula, perfecting frustration here). Mario's first wife died some time ago, and their daughter, Naia (Paula Gallego in one of the year's best performances), harbors resentments and insecurities as a result. Lena wants nothing to do with Manuel, going so far as to question whether his wife actually died by suicide or if he pushed her out the window. Mario and Naia, especially, want to take care of Manuel and refuse to abandon him the way they see so many people discard and ostracize the elderly in society. But maybe Lena's right. Maybe something is very wrong with Manuel.
With phenomenal performances, good pacing, and a surreal and unforgettable ending, The Elderly is one of the year's best horror films. It's quite the lugubrious picture, though. Like life itself, which can only lead to death, there are no happy endings in The Elderly, which works as both a straightforward chiller and also a dark allegory for climate change, dementia, and other ideas.
Great Performances from the Young and the Elderly
Manuel's not right. When he moves in with his family, he leaves behind a disgusting apartment where filth covers the floors and walls, and where the bedroom was used for a fireplace. He's silent most of the time, but when he's not, he's terrifying. "You're going to die tomorrow," he says dead-eyed from across the dinner table to his own son. "I'm going to kill you in your sleep." Lena wants to call the police, or lock him in his room, or put him in a home, or something, just so long as he isn't around. It's a feeling most of us might be well-acquainted with, even if it comes with twangs of guilt.
Manuel isn't the only elderly person acting hostile or strange, though. Old people pop up throughout the film to remind the younger generations of characters of death and mortality, and that even though they may be forgotten, they haven't forgotten about us. A man stands in the hallway, his head shaking, telling Mario that at night, when no one is looking, his head turns all the way around. A senile man in a wheelchair lunges out and bites Naia's boyfriend when he tries to help him. The old manager of a retirement home tells the family that they have no rooms available; they don't see him typing into a computer that's completely unplugged. There is something wrong
Directors Raúl Cerezo and Fernando González Gómez do a phenomenal job of fleshing out this rotting world, predominantly using a hazy brown and orange color palette that reminds one of decay. They pace things out incredibly well, building the narrative in a way so that every character's actions (and their relationship to Manuel) makes complete sense in the moment. They unleash all sorts of hell in a disturbingly grim conclusion that will leave you unsettled.
Their actors deserve a great deal of praise as well. Everyone is wonderful (Zorion Eguileor is surprisingly freaky), but Gustavo Salmerón and Paula Gallego stand out the most. Salmerón is heartbreaking as a son who has suffered immensely throughout life and is torn between three different people (his daughter, his wife, and his father), trying to do right by all of them, which is sadly impossible. Gallego is a pure star, the kind of talent that seems timeless. She has a mixture of cynicism and naïveté as Naia, and both an immense beauty and an innocence you want to protect. She is ultimately the heart of the film, the young generation that will suffer because of her ancestors
The Elderly Are Dying and They're Taking Us With Them
Yes, The Elderly obviously has a lot to do with how we treat the aged, especially as populations continue to grow and economies become less and less capable of caring for all the octogenarians and older. The film, like the recent horror masterpiece Relic, is also concerned with dementia and the crumbling of reality in senility. This alone is horrifying, and the presence of the elderly throughout the film serve as constant harbingers of the inevitable fate which will befall us all — the mind falters, memory slips, the body fails, and every day gains new breeds of suffering. We will all break. How many of us will have someone to collect the pieces?
However, the film is also a nightmarish portrait of climate change and technological progression in different ways. Instead of chapters, The Elderly uses temperatures to track the chronology of the plot, which takes place during a record heat wave that leads to a massive electrical storm. Temperatures begin near 100 degrees Fahrenheit and just keep growing until a chaotic climax near 130 degrees. The tension rises with the heat in perfect synchronicity.
As the elderly threaten to kill the younger generations, it almost seems as if the filmmakers are explaining the linear movement of climate change. While it's hardly an individualized responsibility (and more of a corporate and governmental one), as a monolith, the older generations are responsible for the state of the world. They will die out, but they're taking us with them, having put in place a now irrevocable climatological apocalypse. They've sealed our fate and blood is on their hands, the film seems to say.
Whatever you take away from The Elderly (including the surprising, inexplicable final frames of the film before the credits), it's clear that it's a wonderfully constructed horror film. It's not immaculate, because few films are; there are a couple of tonal incongruities that don't gel with the overall bleak horror of the movie, and a couple of cheap jump scares that aren't worthy of the masterful atmosphere and dread the film creates. Other than that though, this is about as great a horror movie as we're going to get in 2023, with a hauntingly memorable ending and an equally unforgettable star in Paula Gallego.
The Elderly is now available on digital platforms and on demand.
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