Alma is very close to her grandfather although he has retreated into dementia. The family has sold of his beloved thousand-year-old olive tree, to pay his debt, but the loss of the tree has brought the grandfather into a depression. When her grandfather refuses to eat, Alma sets out to find the tree for him. She traces it to a company in Germany and comes up with a plan to rescue and return the highly symbolic tree.

The Olive Tree is a bittersweet comedy-drama, written by Paul Laverty, also the writer behind I, Daniel Blake. The film gives a portrait of people that have an unbroken bond between different generations, although not between all family members. It nearly got chosen as the Spanish submission for the Best Foreign Language Film at the Oscars. WFC has previously screened another film by director Iciar Bollain, Even the Rain (2010), where a director arrives in Bolivia to make a documentary on Spanish imperialism but ends up in a conflict of water. You might also recognise Javier Gutiérrez from Alberto Rodriguez’s award-winning Marshland, also screened at WFC.

“Commentary on a changing Europe – and especially a socially and economically forlorn Spain… but the human relationships are most poignant here, especially the one between Alma and her ailing grandfather”, TimeOut.

“The performances are uniformly strong, and therefore the all-important dynamics between the characters”, Hollywood Reporter