“Todo lo invisible”: to see or not to see the dramatic comedy with Bárbara Mori on Prime Video

While taking his two youngest daughters to school, Jonás (Ari Brickman) suffers an unusual accident: the air bag in his car bursts in his face, leaving him blind. From then on, his life and that of his family will change substantially. As affected as Jonás by the accident and the changes is Amanda (Barbara Mori), his wife. Although initially she tries to cope with her life following her work and personal routine, the truth is that nothing is (and will never be) the same.

The main person responsible for making it clear that nothing will be the same is precisely Jonás, a dentist who abruptly has to leave his office and become a family man who – bottles of liquor in hand – tries to go unnoticed in his home. In this sense, he carries out activities (or tries to) without asking for help from anyone, like when he prepares a coffee when he wakes up or like when he has to go pick up his daughters from school mobility after their day of classes.

This is, words more, words less, the argument of “everything unseen”, a film directed by Mariana Chenillo that premiered in Mexico in 2020, but has just crossed borders thanks to Amazon Prime Video. This is a dramatic comedy that has an accidental disability as the axis of a series of discoveries for its protagonists.

When we speak of discoveries we refer not only to those physical. Like the obvious change that it means for Amanda to have to help her husband up the stairs. Or the change that implies for Jonás having to ask her daughters for help to tell him if she has already boiled the water in a pot or not. In “everything unseen” There are also a series of personal or intimate discoveries that could easily generate empathy.

After the accident described, Jonás tries to win a million-dollar lawsuit against the manufacturer of the car that “failed” and took away his ability to see. On that road he meets his old friend Saúl (José María de Tavira), a lawyer who has in common with him having had an old romantic relationship with Amanda. Here, then, a love triangle arises (or re-emerges) that – throughout more than half of the film – will expose the good and the bad of a contemporary marriage.

Although Jonás does not initially distrust Saúl, the passing of hours, days and a couple of events, motivates his fears to surface. Here he decides to cut short his relationship with Amanda and leave home. Separated then, he and she experience what her life would be like without each other. To what extent is one capable of leaving his “established life” and losing everything just because of a scene of jealousy? Is it easier today to make the decision to divorce than it was for our parents?

Of course “everything unseen” is not a film of two, or three (if we count the ‘hummingbird’ Saúl). This drama also includes Amanda’s and Jonah’s families. The first insignificant for analysis, and the second full of small “doors” that the viewer will discover as the minutes go by.

Technically it is worth saying that the insecurities of the blind protagonist are accompanied by a kind of hallucinations that, curiously, occur only when the lights of any space where he is are turned off. Although at first Jonás seems to cope with them, at various times in the story he seems defeated by his recurrence. From his natural stubbornness, the character rejects psychological help. Deep down, by recognizing who appears in each ‘hallucination’, he believes he has everything under control.

In the debate about whether today the “great themes” of literature, cinema and other arts have been left behind to give way to an interest in the everyday, “everything unseen” fits perfectly because it is an immersion in those little things that torment us in our day to day. From a guy who –although he knows that his wife married him out of love, can’t help but feel afraid that she will leave him because today he is severely visually impaired–, to a woman who, alone in her bedroom, decides to see photos of her handsome ex boyfriend. It is each of these moments that remind us that humanity is far from being understood in its entirety, although more and more self-help books are published and more romantic films are released.

THE TOKEN:

Original title: “Everything unseen”.

Synopsis: Sudden blindness caused by an accident leaves Jonas totally out of the game. Circumstances will lead him to discover other paths, hitherto unsuspected, in order to move forward.

Platform: Amazon Prime Video.

Duration: 100 minutes

Classification: +16.

Rating: ★★★.

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