Phoenix 24
A terminal diagnosis transforms ordinary pleasures into acts of resistance against disappearance.
ROME, ITALY
Spanish filmmaker Isabel Coixet returns to her most intimate territory with Three Goodbyes, a restrained drama about separation, terminal illness and the unexpected discovery of how intensely life can be experienced when time becomes limited. The film opens in France this week before reaching Argentina and Chile later in the month.
Alba Rohrwacher portrays Marta, a physical education teacher whose relationship with Antonio, a chef played by Elio Germano, has collapsed. While she initially responds to the breakup with anger and melancholy, a stage-four cancer diagnosis confronts her with a far more definitive loss and changes how she understands herself and those around her.
The screenplay draws from stories by Italian writer and feminist activist Michela Murgia, who died from cancer at 51. Coixet and co-writer Enrico Audenino used the autobiographical dimensions of Murgia’s posthumous collection Tre ciotole as the foundation for a narrative that examines illness without transforming its protagonist into an idealized victim.
Filmed in Italian and shot on 35-millimeter film, the production presents a lived-in Rome rather than a polished tourist postcard. Small experiences carry its emotional weight: eating ice cream, watching flocks of starlings, riding through the city and becoming receptive to another person’s suffering. Humor interrupts the sadness, allowing Marta to remain contradictory, difficult and fully human.
Coixet describes the film as an exploration of the moment when a person finally understands what being alive means, sometimes only after recognizing that death is near. Instead of offering a sermon about optimism, Three Goodbyes argues through gestures and sensory details that an ordinary life can become extraordinary when it is observed with complete attention.
Detrás de cada dato, la intención. / Behind every data point, the intention.