El Espiritu de la Colmena / The Spirit of the Beehive (1973 Victor Erice)

I hadn't really realised before how like To Kill a Mockingbird it is, from the credits onwards. And, in fact, like Whistle Down the Wind.

Fernando Fernan Gomez, Teresa Gimpera, Ana Torrent (still working), Isabel Telleria.

An elusive film (what's in the letter mother gets? Bad news or no news?) but painted in light wonderfully by Luis Cuadrado, whose interiors are beautifully dark and contrasty, like Caravaggio, but the exteriors are washed out and shot on overcast days, giving the sky a white quality. The gently evocative music is by Luis de Pablo. Erice has this great way of fading one scene into another.