Atopando o camiño
2019 · 16m · España
Directed by Andrés Castro, María Fanjul
Genres: comedy, coming-of-age, family
Tones: humorous, tender, whimsical
Two schoolgirls get lost in the forest while walking the Camino de Santiago with their class. The mishap changes their lives for the better in a gentle comedy about friendship.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A gentle coming-of-age comedy about two girls getting lost on the Camino—sound asleep yet? The real subversion here would've been if the forest actually changed them, not just their friendship branding; as written, it's competent feel-good that doesn't resist a single consensus beat.
Castro and Fanjul work within the well-established lineage of European coming-of-age cinema with measured restraint, letting the Camino's spiritual geography anchor what could've been a frantic plot—the film's formal patience with its schoolgirl protagonists suggests a curatorial awareness of the tradition it inhabits.
The decision to let the girls' disorientation unfold in real time through sound design—the forest closing in without manipulative score—is what transforms a premise about mishap into something that genuinely breathes; that choice alone elevates what could've been saccharine into something alive.