『Between the Sun and the Wind, a Dangerous Flame of Liberation Blossoms in a Mother and Daughter's Shade』
🎥 Film Overview
🎬 Title: Hot Milk (2025)
🌍 Country: 🇬🇧 United Kingdom / 🇬🇷 Greece
🎞️ Genre: Drama / Romance / Psychological
🗓️ Production & Release: Film4 / Bonnie Productions / Heretic, 2025
⏳ Running time: 93 minutes
📢 Director: Rebecca Lenkiewicz
🖋️ Screenplay: Rebecca Lenkiewicz
📖 Source: Deborah Levy, Hot Milk
📺 Platform: MUBI
👩💼 Cast: Emma Mackey — Sofia
Vicky Krieps — Ingrid
🧩 Story Deep Dive (Spoilers)
🌊 Boiling Desire and the Mother-Daughter Yoke
The protagonist Sofia is an anthropology graduate student who has put her life on hold for years to care for her mother, Rose, who suffers from unexplained leg paralysis. The mother and daughter travel to a mysterious clinic run by Dr. Gómez on the Spanish coast (Almería) seeking treatment for Rose.
- Sofia: A woman in her twenties trapped by her mother's demands and the duty of caregiving. She harbors both suppressed anger and a yearning to find herself.
- Rose: A capricious, manipulative mother. Throughout the film it remains ambiguous whether her paralysis is a physical ailment or a manifestation of psychogenic (psychological) trauma.
- Ingrid: A free-spirited, enchanting seamstress Sofia meets on the beach. Her relationship with Sofia acts as the catalyst for Sofia's recognition of repressed desire and independence.
- Dr. Gómez: A mysterious practitioner who focuses less on Rose’s physical symptoms and more on excavating psychological trauma.
🧬 Codependency and Emotional Entrapment
The film centers on the pathological codependent relationship between Rose and Sofia. Rose’s “illness” functions almost as a means to keep Sofia by her side. Critics point out that Rose’s obsessive and mercurial demands instill both guilt and anger in Sofia, gradually eating away at Sofia’s life. Trapped in the role of caregiver, Sofia sacrifices her desires, studies, and identity, ensnared in her mother’s trap (Entrapment).
🩺 The Boundary Between the Physical and the Psychological
Rose’s paralysis is one of the film’s greatest mysteries. Dr. Gómez suggests that the symptom may be psychogenic—rooted in a hidden trauma from Rose’s childhood. The film explores how the truth of Rose’s illness governs Sofia’s present, visualizing the impact of repressed emotion on the body.
🌈 Desire and the Discovery of Identity
🌾 A Symbol of Freedom and Boldness
Ingrid stands in stark contrast to Sofia’s stifling reality—the caregiving burden and the oppressive stillness of Spain’s heat. She arrives on the beach on horseback, works as a seamstress, and is emotionally uninhibited and unpredictable. To Sofia, Ingrid is embodied evidence of “taking control of one’s life,” visually representing the independence and liberation Sofia craves.
👩❤️💋👩 The Catalyst of Desire
For years Sofia has suppressed her sexual desires and personal needs under the weight of guilt imposed by her mother. Her affair with Ingrid is the first time Sofia makes a choice for herself, prompting her to explore repressed feelings and sexual identity. Their intense but volatile lovemaking gives Sofia the strength and courage to assert her existence.
🌴 Mirrored Shadows
- Though Ingrid appears to be the embodiment of freedom, the film gradually reveals that she too is trapped by dark secrets and trauma. Ingrid’s shocking confessions (including references to murder) and unpredictable behavior suggest that she, like Rose, is bound by the “chains of trauma.”
Ultimately, Ingrid is both the projection of Sofia’s desired liberated self and the mirror of another woman trapped by trauma. This similarity may explain why Sofia is so drawn to Ingrid—unconsciously, she recognizes traces of her mother Rose’s wounds in her.
🔬 Inconsistencies and an Underdeveloped Romance
Some critics argue that despite the strong performances by Emma Mackey and Vicky Krieps, the chemistry between the two falls short of expectations. This may be because Ingrid’s character fails to fully convey the novel’s interior ambiguity on film, functioning more as an instrument for Sofia’s liberation than as a fully realized person. Their romance is treated more as a narrative device to drive Sofia’s inner transformation than as an emotionally rich, realistic relationship.
💡 “Questions shape thought, and thought shapes reality”
Sofia’s relationship with Ingrid ultimately enables her to break free of blind dependence on her mother and achieve individuation.
- The encounter with Ingrid allows Sofia to confirm her desires, articulate suppressed anger (symbolized by the scene where she threatens the neighbor with a knife), and ultimately demand the truth from her mother and attempt to sever the toxic parental bond.
In Hot Milk, Ingrid offers Sofia the realization that "The world depends on what kind of questions you allow yourself to ask." In other words, Ingrid is not an external savior who “treats” Sofia, but rather a sower of liberation: she plants the seeds that compel Sofia to ask inner questions and break away from the toxic bond with her mother.
This relationship is the most vivid and sensual chapter of Sofia’s coming-of-age story, portraying her final steps toward adulthood in striking visual terms.
✨ A Painful Journey Toward Liberation
Hot Milk uncomfortably and feverishly examines the suffocating ambivalence of a mother-daughter relationship and the woman’s search for self-liberation. Sofia’s final choice is ambiguous, but can be read as a powerful assertion of her will to reclaim control over her life. The memorable performances (including Emma Mackey and Fiona Shaw) and the film’s beautiful yet unsettling mise-en-scène leave a lasting impression for viewers who can find joy in liberation amid discomfort.
🎯 Personal (Taste) Rating
💕 Love scenes intensity: ♥♥♥
⭐ Rating: ★★★☆
Comments
Post a Comment