ROPES

Directed by:  Jose Luis Montesinos

Starring: Paula del Rio, Miguel Angel Jenner, Jordi Aguilar

Shortly after a horrific car accident that killed her twin sister Vera and left her a quadriplegic, Elena returns to her family home with her ailing father. Now completely wheelchair bound and with only slight mobility in one arm, Elena is provided with a helper dog called Athos . However, when Athos is bitten by a bat, he turns rabid, and Elena finds herself trapped…

Ropes, aka Prey, is a very assured first feature from director Jose Luis Montesinos but is not without its problems.

As the film opens we find our protagonist Elena observing from the car as her father lays flowers at the scene of her accident, which killed her sister. She is very sullen, and antagonistic towards her father. Its evident that she's suffering from survivor's guilt and simultaneously having a difficult time adjusting to her new circumstances, strapped in a motorized wheelchair and with very limited control over her arms.

 Things escalate quickly however. The house they arrive in has been having some renovations, to make it wheel-chair friendly. A stairlift has been installed but some of the ramps have yet to be finished and Elena's father has delayed work - we find out why later on. In one of the rooms being renovated, Athos finds what is thought to be a dead bat - until it suddenly attacks him and bites his neck. After a terse argument, Elena's father has a heart attack and keels over outside. Elena can't reach him because of the lack of ramps and Athos suddenly becomes fully rabid and attacks the father's body!

 The title of the film comes from the fact that the door handles in the house have ropes attached to them so Athos can grab them and pull doors open for Elena. Because the renovations weren't finished, this makes the house more accessible for Athos than it is for Elena! While she is able to stop him gaining direct entry into the house, Athos is able to make his way into the airducts. The film makes good use of surround sound as we hear Athos's progress, scampering through the upstairs vents as Elena apprehensively listens to work out where he is.

 The film goes to great lengths to emphasise Elena's precarious position and how limited her mobility is. Luckily she is relatively astute and able to utilise certain objects to her advantage. There are moments where her disability compounds a problem such as when she tries to nudge a phone off a sideboard only for it to fall between her feet, where she cannot reach it.

 The script embellished its small cast by having Elena being confronted by an illusion of her dead sister. Clearly there was a love/hate relationship between the pair, and Elena's guilt has manifested her as an angry, sarcastic antagonist. It's a useful plot device to allow Elena someone to talk to and to provide a little exposition. The fact that Vera is also played by Paula del Rio adds to the fun as she gives Vera a completely different personality and the editing does a good job of allowing you to believe the pair are In the same room as each other.

There are a couple of moments which are unintentionally funny. Elena having to constantly rock back and forth to knock things onto her lap or to try and open a door becomes almost farcical because the camera lingers for so long watching Elena work. The other instance is Elena's pet ferret, which gets mauled by Athos and becomes rabid as well. Unlike Athos up to that point in the film, the ferret manages to launch itself at Elena and attack her. She manages to escape further injury in the silliest way imaginable.

THE VERDICT

Ropes is for the most part a very well made thriller which deals with some testy issues. Having a quadraplegic character as your protagonist is pretty ballsy and adds a whole new layer of difficulty and adversity for her to overcome, and the script doesn't cheat by having her find easy solutions. This is both an arduously physical and psychological challenge for Elena to face, with a very dangerous adversary.

7 out of 10 MIkeOutWest