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On the way to her father Tona’s (Mateo García Elizondo) birthday party, 7-year-old Sol (Naíma Sentíes) spiritedly wears the kind of rainbow wig and red button nose usually reserved for clowns and shares a solemn wish for the evening: for her daddy not to die.

Hosted at her grandfather’s house (Alberto Amador), where a bird of prey symbolically lurks outside, the night’s celebration has been planned for what sounds like months. It’s a special occasion because it’s likely that this will be Tona’s last birthday before he dies from terminal cancer. More treatment could potentially help him live a little longer, but he and everyone else in the family are so pushed to their financial limits that even his beloved nurse, Cruz (Teresita Sánchez), has to awkwardly broach the subject that she hasn’t been paid in more than two weeks. 

Read the full review at 425.