This film was released 24th June 2016, and is no longer screening.

The new film from director Julio Medem (Lovers of the Arctic Circle, Sex and Lucia) is something of a departure for him; while his previous work contains an abundance of sex and magical realist flourishes, Ma Ma is, by his usual standards, a relatively straightforward account of how one woman deals with her diagnosis of breast cancer.

On the day that Magda (Penélope Cruz, who gives an outstanding performance of quiet resolve) receives the news of her illness, she meets at her son’s football match Arturo (Luis Tosar), who, in the course of their conversation, receives a call informing him that his daughter has been killed in a car crash and his wife is in a coma. The two become closer, but the progression of her illness remains to the fore, and is complicated by an unexpected pregnancy. (Notes by Kevin Coyne.)