Miedo
2019 · 5m · España
Directed by David Salinas
Genres: coming-of-age, drama, romance
Tones: contemplative, tender
A young man is in love with a girl, but his fears stop him from speaking to her — until one day he finally gathers the courage to face them.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A boy likes a girl and fear stops him—it's the most well-trodden rom-com premise alive, and Salinas doesn't seem interested in subverting it one bit, which makes this feel like something I've already watched a hundred times before.
Salinas works in a tradition of tender coming-of-age portraiture, and the film's contemplative pacing respects that lineage, though it doesn't quite carve out new formal territory within the romantic-vulnerability canon.
The real work here lives in how Salinas uses negative space and silence—the moments where the young man *doesn't* speak tell you everything about his interior life, and that restraint is what transforms a simple premise into something that actually breathes.