Paula Hernández Director of Chuva (Rain)

How did you manage to keep the story on an intimate level while working with such a large production? Unlike my previous film, for Rain I wanted first to write down what I had in my head, and later think about how to resolve it, because when you write ’it rains’ in the script, you know it’s going to need a larger production. That was the biggest risk for the film, and that was very complex for everyone, for the actors mainly, because the film was set to be a "story of two", where the rest of the elements were off-camera, out of focus. During the writing process I prioritized a story and a certain style, a way to narrate visually, something like a visual code for the film. But when you have a great level of production you feel tempted to start making more things that you planned to! That’s when you have to return to a much more austere state.

At first, it might seem that there are only two leads, but then we find more characters in your film: highways, buildings, hotel rooms, apartments, cars… Yes, it’s the two of them, the city and the rain. I always thought it’d take place in Buenos Aires, but I didn’t want a realistic Bs.As., the city doesn’t have that fog, that rain. I wanted a city which had its own logic in relation to the story of the film. It can be Bs.As. or any other contemporary city, where you can be sort of anonymous. Alma turns her car into a temporary house, therefore the city has a different use for her, the bars, the gas stations, the bathrooms, etc. Same with Roberto, a hotel is not a house, it’s a place of transit.

The rain is a state of a circular process. Life is also a cycle: the old father in his last days, and the new life that might begin at the end of the film.. To live implies having these cycles in your life, circles that you keep completing. For them to move on, it was necessary to hit the brakes, to remember how much burden they bring from the past, and to look for answers they never found before. No matter if they find them or not, just the act of searching is important.

Valeria Bertuccelli, who plays Alma, sings one of the songs in the film. Yes, we had this French song almost secured, but in the end we didn’t get the proper rights to use it. One day Valeria and Vicentico [her husband, leader of renowned Argentinian band Los Fabulosos Cadillacs] came to me with a song. It was strange, we never thought Valeria would sing for the movie. It was an act of love! The incidental music also sets a tone for the film. It was complicated because I felt that the rain and traffic jam could already construct a sound code. So I had to add something that didn’t compete with that code, but flow with it. Sebastián Escofett’s score provides the exact tone of melancholy needed.

Laslo Rojas