Lovers of the Arctic Circle

Los Amantes del Círculo Polar
a film by Julio Medem

A passionate and secret love story narrated by Ana and Otto, from the age of eight until the age of twenty-five. The story begins in 1980, when after school a girl and a boy start to run for different reasons. From that afternoon the lives of Ana and Otto will be intertwined in a single circle that will begin to close seventeen years later, in Finland, on the very edge of the Arctic Circle.

Ana is running away from her mother, denying that her father has died in a car crash. Otto is chasing a football kicked by another boy after school. As they encounter each other with a stare that begins their strange relationship, Ana sees the spirit of her dead father in Otto. At the same moment Otto falls in love with Ana, and she knows it will be forever. At that moment both project a desire for love, the girl for her father and the boy for his mother, and they are both there for each other.

But all things are transient, even love, and Otto's father and mother separate. By chance again, the two children are brought closer still when Olga, Ana's mother and Álvaro, Otto's father meet and a relationship begins. Both parents encourage their children to be like brother and sister but this is not what Ana and Otto want, and the feelings they share, as they become lovers, have to remain hidden and secret.

Ana relates to her life as a string of chance events. Otto sees life as running in a circle – one begins at a certain part of the circle and at the end one reaches the point at which one began. Throughout the film the narrative switches between the two characters: following the perspective of each in flashbacks and current events; illuminating thoughts and motivations; exploring what the events in each life mean to the character. The connections are intricate and complex, the visual storytelling compelling. The film sets forth the premise that random chance is somehow organised – it is chance, but with a destiny, a kind of intention or will.

A stunning, beautiful and unique film about love, our choices in life, and the power of our emotions. It is also a treatise on the nature of fate and coincidence, its recurring metaphors exploring the connections in a cyclic rhythm of destiny.