Sand Dollars

By: Amos Lassen

"Sand Dollars" is a psychologically nuanced portrait of two women in love in the Dominican Republic. 20-year-old Noeli (Yanet Mojica) learns that a Frenchman (Bernard Bizel) that she has presumably been with is returning to Europe, and she asks him for money. Instead, he gives her a chain, which she and her boyfriend Yeremi (Ricardo Ariel Toribio) immediately sell. The guy was probably one of many visitors whose generosity Noeli uses to her advantage on the beaches at Samana. But then she meets Anne (Geraldine Chaplin) who is hopelessly in love with her.

sand dollars poster

Anne's back-story is only sketched in, but the discreet script provides all that's needed, and Chaplin's intelligent, vulnerable performance does the rest. She is a relatively well-off woman who's part of the intellectual jet set She has a son in France from whom she is estranged from her son in France, even though she speaks of returning to Paris. It is Noeli's youth, her vivacity and her body that keeps Anne in the Dominican Republic in a kind of limbo. Does Noeli get out these three years in this lopsided relationship? Anne has promised to get her a visa so the two can go to France together. Anne gives her money that she uses to support the unemployed Yeremi who she passes off as her brother.

sand dollars

Noeli won't say it but cash and the promise of a visa aren't the only reasons she keeps going back to Anne, and part of the film's strength is that it does not reduce these characters to stereotypes. There's the sense of ease Noeli feels in the older woman's company, the feeling of protection and playfulness, even when the latter occasionally descends into power games- Anne may have status and money, but Noeli has youth, and she's not above toying with her benefactress to get what she wants.

Directors Laura Guzman and Isabel Cardenas know where they are going with this film. Anne is very unsatisfied with how life has turned out, full of endless possibilities yet little impetus and she knows that her obsession with Noeli is untenable. The film also has something to say about the jet set- the old-moneyed subset with just enough liquidity to allow them the luxury of a global, multilingual lifestyle. It may look glamorous but there is something deeply unsatisfying about such a directionless existence. Anne passes her days in a large, empty hotel, occasionally meeting up with old friends like the similarly jaded Thomas (Hoyt Rogers), or meeting new ones like Goya (Maria Gabriella Bonetti), who could be a younger version of herself.

Chaplin's performance is beautiful and is characterized by a lack of vanity and an almost magical combination of empathy and pathos. Anne knows that she is deluding herself, which means she's completely aware of the impossibility of her obsession, and yet, as seen through Chaplin's emotionally riveting, fearsomely needy eyes, her humanity is all too understandable. Noeli also yearns for something; she wants a true demonstration of Yeremi's love - yet is unlikely to find satisfaction.

This is a film about dreams-those of a gracefully aging lady and her young lover with a trembling delicacy and attentiveness. There is a sense of ambiguity- while Anne is in love with Noeli, they are both aware that Anne's money is what has held them together for three years. It's a form of prostitution, but not exactly that, and the script is nicely delicate about the way it explores the uncertainties of their relationship.

Neither woman knows much about the other, and it's better that way. The money guarantees that Noeli gets her fantasy of a life in Paris while Anne gets her fantasy that this girl might actually love her. However, things start to unravel when Noeli realizes she's pregnant and her Parisian dream suddenly becomes closer.

The story moves forward subtly and in small, unexpected ways, cleverly challenging expectation stereotypes as it goes. If Noeli is digging for gold, then the audience understands exactly why, despite a performance from Mojica which is almost wordless. And though Yeremi has the macho look his culture expects of him, like Noeli, he is just a typical, insecure kid.

There is something of the feel of intimate documentary about the dialogues, which appear to be partly improvised. This drive for authenticity means that several silences drag on too long, but as the camera lingers on the face of Chaplin, longing and hopeless before suddenly exploding into a radiant smile, or on the dancing body of Noeli, enjoying the movement but also the power it gives her, it is so worth it.

Geraldine Chapman who, at 70, brings the opposing of the increased fragility and knowledge of old age to French woman Anne. She has more or less migrated to the Dominican Republic, where during the warm days she tries to cover her loneliness by her relationship with Noeli. For Noelí, it is a relationship of convenience, with Anne just a regular among a string of foreigners whom she cultivates 'friendships' with in return for gifts that she and her boyfriend are sold for cash.

Everything about Noelí is in contrast to Anne from the surface details of the color of her skin and dress. Anne has the idea of taking the younger girl to Paris, where she can have her to herself, while Noelí is happy to embrace the scheme with the view of sending cash back to her beau.

Guzmán and Cárdenas explore the intensifying of the women's relationship without passing judgment.