A Widow’s Game
A true-life murder case in Valencia, Spain, is given a forensic work-over in this solid if unexciting Netflix programmer.
Bride of Valencia: Ivana Baquero (with Álex Gadea)
Photo courtesy of Netflix.
A bit of a shocker, this. The number one attraction on Netflix last week, Carlos Sedes’ crime drama is “based on true events.” It opens in an underground car park where an unseen body is discovered behind a car, although the extent of the carnage is all too apparent to a couple who have just arrived on a motorbike. However, the viewer is spared the actual butchery. This is the story of the ensuing investigation, carried out by a crack team from Valencia’s Homicide Unit, a department with a 98% track record for solving the crimes they investigate (“better than Madrid,” we are told).
The first chapter of Sedes’ Spanish police procedural is devoted to Eva Torres (Carmen Machi), a no-nonsense copper dealing with her own private issues (her daughter is on the verge of being expelled from school), before landing this particularly grisly case. But Eva has a well-honed intuition and the young widow of the murder victim, María Jesús Moreno (Ivana Baquero) – aka ‘Maje’ – is looking as guilty as hell. The film then cuts to Maje’s side of the story, before exploring the backstory of Maje’s colleague Salvador Rodrigo (Tristán Ulloa) who, although married with a grown-up daughter, has an unseemly crush on Maje.
The murder case was something of a cause célèbre in Spain, not because of the killing per se, but because of its provocative protagonist, dubbed ‘La Viuda Negra de Patraix’, or ‘The Black Widow of Patraix.’ The victim, Arturo, is merely a statistic, and the actual murder has been committed before the opening title, so any suspense is sacrificed on the altar of the investigation. As Maje, Ivana Baquero (Ofelia in Pan’s Labyrinth) cuts an alluring figure, a femme fatale who is at once a caring nurse and a ruthless manipulator of the men in her life. But the star of the film is Machi, whose dogged detective would give Vera Stanhope a run for her money. And yet the six screenwriters assigned to the case have given her little opportunity to shine beyond the initial run-in with her daughter’s teachers. What’s left over makes the sensational seem rather mundane, something we haven’t already seen a hundred time before.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Ivana Baquero, Tristán Ulloa, Carmen Machi, Pablo Molinero, Pepe Ocio, Álex Gadea, Joel Sánchez, Amparo Fernández.
Dir Carlos Sedes, Pro Víctor Fandiño 'Fandi' and Ramón Campos, Screenplay Ramón Campos, Gema R. Neira, Jon de la Cuesta, Ricardo Jornet, David Orea and Javier Chacártegui, Ph Daniel Sosa, Pro Des Ángel Amaro, Ed Diego Fajardo and Andrés Federico González, Music Adrian Foulkes and Federico Jusid, Costumes Antonio M. Sánchez de Dios, Sound Quim Rubí.
Bambú Producciones-Netflix.
122 mins. Spain. 2025. UK and US Rel: 30 May 2025. Cert. 15.
