It's Christmas Eve, 1986, and Borja is a precocious teenager with a passion for film. As his family comes together to celebrate the holiday, the combined forces of the suffocating Chilean heat, free-flowing drinks, and repressed desire contribute to the eruption of long-held secrets. Both an enticing family melodrama and an explicit erotic thriller, this is a story about the ways that passion and desire control our lives - from pop-culture tastes to sexual fantasies.
Two brothers "Vicente" (Santiago Rodríguez Costabal) and "Borja" (his real life brother Cristóbal) are gearing up with their mother "Irene" (Carmina Riego) to celebrate their first Christmas without their father. As the family assembles, the drink flows and the claustrophobic environment takes hold and the young "Borja" begins to let the badger loose a little. His hither-to repressed sexuality begins to take hold and he also makes rather a startling discovery when exploring the drawers (furniture) of his elder brother. What now ensues is a sort of uncomfortably constructed family melodrama with very little dialogue and, for me anyway, very little purpose. It has vaguely incestuous undertones - and there is plenty of nudity (active and passive) but the story and the characterisations are woefully undercooked. What drama there is seems to be contrived, repetitive and as it rumbles on there is a frankly ridiculous scene with their mother and the ending just really doesn't deliver. It is curious to see to siblings working together with some pretty honest intimacy but otherwise this is a poorly paced and rather lacklustre story, prone to stereotype, that you will instantly forget. The soundtrack isn't bad, though!