Clara Sola
Oscilloscope Laboratories | Release Date: July 1, 2022 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
77
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 15 Critic Reviews
Positive:
13
Mixed:
2
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleJul 7, 2022
There might be no better time than now to mainline a story about a repressed woman pushing at restrictions in her culturally conservative world, which Nathalie Álvarez Mesén’s Clara Sola offers up with a forestful of divine energy, artistry, and mystery. Read full review
85
Film ThreatSabina Dana PlasseJul 21, 2022
Clara Sola is an intriguing film ripe with symbolism and strong performances. Read full review
83
IndieWireDavid EhrlichJun 29, 2022
Clara Sola is fleshed with the feeling that love and repression are braided together. It’s bound by the sense that we smother the things most precious to us in order to keep them from getting away. Read full review
82
TheWrapSteve PondAug 31, 2021
Clara Sola mixes religion, mysticism and sexuality in a way that feels simultaneously odd, disquieting and richly rewarding. It starts out beautifully restrained and ends up somewhere else entirely, but it’s all the more interesting for its split personality. Read full review
80
The GuardianPeter BradshawNov 16, 2022
Clara Sola is superbly filmed and composed with a very humid sense of atmosphere, and Araya’s performance is a miracle of sympathy and candour. Read full review
80
The New York TimesDevika GirishJun 30, 2022
Araya is remarkably tender as she sinks her fingers into the earth or gingerly lifts bugs off the ground, while Sophie Winqvist Loggins’s hushed, soft-focus camerawork imbues these moments with an almost spiritual grace. Read full review
80
Screen DailyJonathan RomneyAug 31, 2021
What gives the film a force that balances out the delicacy is a commanding, charismatic lead by Wendy Chinchilla Araya, best known as a dancer, whose highly physical presence in turn evokes Clara’s sensitivity, isolation, vulnerability, fury and – despite the pressure to keep it hidden – powerful sexuality. Read full review
80
VarietyJessica KiangAug 31, 2021
Mesen’s delicate yet earthy, thoughtful yet sensual movie never tips its hand as to whether Clara’s abilities are real or imaginary — indeed it makes the line between fact and fantasy seem as nonsensical as it might to a horse — and it pays off in one of those obscurely uplifting endings. Read full review
80
The Hollywood ReporterSheri LindenAug 31, 2021
Set in a rural village and cast with nonactors, led by a feral performance from dancer Wendy Chinchilla Araya, the drama occupies its own territory, tinged with magical realism and deeply immersed in the sensory world. It’s also a vivid reminder that even a matriarchy can be paternalistic. Read full review
78
Paste MagazineNatalia KeoganJun 30, 2022
Clara Sola remains rooted in a magical realism that gracefully grapples with the patriarchal limits imposed on women’s sexual pleasure, particularly when fellow women enforce them. Read full review
75
The Film StageSoham GadreJul 7, 2022
Clara Sola builds momentum to its eventual thesis––where one’s natural state is free and unconstrained by the bounds of oppressive culture and social construct. Read full review
75
RogerEbert.comSheila O'MalleyJul 1, 2022
This is Mesén's debut feature film, and it's a powerful and intuitive piece of work. Read full review
75
Movie NationRoger MooreJun 20, 2022
It makes for an engrossing character study, a Latin film with lots of local color, a hint of magical realism and an air of hopelessness tinged with menace — a unique cinematic experience. Read full review
60
The Observer (UK)Wendy IdeNov 23, 2022
This atmospheric debut from Costa Rican-Swedish director Nathalie Álvarez Mesén combines mud, moss and mysticism to arresting effect. Read full review
50
Little White LiesFinlay SpencerNov 18, 2022
The feverish and feral performance by Araya drags the film back from operating as a wispy metaphor. Read full review
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