Chelsea Alexandra
Being forced to face change is uncomfortable. No matter the reason, having to upend your life and figure out a new way of being is a daunting prospect. Change makes you face parts of yourself you’d rather ignore. You are forced to face the messy parts, the things that you’ve been ignoring for so long, and you forgot that they were there. Change, rediscovery, no matter how hard it can be (and it is hard), is one of the most beautiful moments you can go through. It feels exactly how living is supposed to feel, fully charged with so much emotion. You’re changing, you’re finding yourself, you’re alive. That’s exactly the kind of journey Abril takes you on. Straight off its run at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival, Abril will be featured as the Opening Night film at the 2026 Portland Panorama Film Festival.
Abril (Maricarmen Merino) is an emotionally drained social worker who has spent years holding her life together. She is a creature of structure and routine. From her professional life to her personal life, Abril has centered her life around being a caretaker. Now, recently divorced, she shares a small, strained home with her teenage daughter, Valentina (Lara Yuja Mora). Their fragile dynamic begins to crack during a family therapy session when Valentina announces she wants to leave and live with her father, Julián (Hernán Jiménez). For the first time in years, Abril is left alone, stripped of the role that has defined her identity and structured her every day.
She eventually meets Gabriel (Francois Arnaud), a charming bartender who brings a kind of ease into her life that she hasn’t felt in a long time. Being around him lets Abril see a different version of herself. For a moment, it feels like she might actually get to live for herself instead of just taking care of everyone else. But as they get closer, the cracks start to show. All the unresolved feelings from her marriage, mixed with her own insecurities and burnout, slowly creep back in. As more truths about what really ended things with Julián start to come out, it all hits her at once.
Abril really works best when you approach it as a character study. The plot is present, but it is not necessarily the driving force of the film. Everything circles back to Abril and the process of her figuring out who she is after realizing how much of herself she has lost along the way. She had spent years defined by service and caregiving, and the film carefully peels back all of the layers. When those roles begin to fall away, Abril becomes a raw and honest film about finding yourself. Patience is what makes this film also so effective. Abril is a film that takes its time; it never rushes Abril towards her growth for the sake of drama. It allows the audience to get to know Abril, empathize with her, and care about her journey towards rediscovery. By the time the film reaches its more emotional moments, it doesn’t feel like a sudden shift. It feels earned.
The film also smartly ties her personal unraveling to her work as a social worker. She’s constantly absorbing other people’s problems, and it becomes clear that she’s been avoiding her own for a long time. That overlap makes her burnout feel even more real.
Merino plays Abril with this constant, low-level exhaustion that never really goes away, like she’s always one minor setback from coming undone. You can see the weight she’s carrying in every interaction. Arnaud is a really nice surprise for Gabriel. He brings a kind of easy charm that doesn’t feel forced. Instead, he feels natural, and his chemistry with Merino is low-key but believable. There’s a relaxed energy to their scenes together that makes sense for where Abril is in her life.
Jiménez’s direction in Abril is really what sets the tone for the entire film. He keeps everything restrained and intentional, never pushing the story into overly dramatic territory even when the material easily could’ve gone there. Instead, he leans into subtlety, letting scenes breathe and trusting the audience to pick up on what’s happening beneath the surface. That slower, slice-of-life pacing is going to be hit or miss depending on what you’re into. It definitely leans slow, but not in a way that feels pointless. Jiménez isn’t in a rush to get anywhere, which works because the story itself is about being stuck.
Abril ultimately lands on something that feels like it should be part of a much bigger conversation. Starting over isn’t something to be ashamed of, even though it’s so often framed that way. The film pushes back against that idea, showing that starting over can actually be something meaningful, even beautiful, if you’re willing to sit with what comes with it. It’s messy, uncomfortable, and sometimes a little disorienting. And that’s what makes it feel real. Abril’s journey shows that there’s courage in restarting and rediscovery. There is a fearlessness in letting go of what no longer works, and in giving yourself permission to begin again.
