Amador

This is a peek into the trials and tribulations of a young immigrant woman who is trying to pay off a refrigerator for her boyfriend's flower business. Seattle's 2011 International Film Festival showcases this movie from Spain where we see the young woman as she is hired to care for an elderly man named Amador, who inconveniently dies before she can pay off that loan.

We watch with mixed emotions as she continues to work there as though nothing has happened: some of her tactics are actually pretty funny, but as time passes the situation becomes horrific, too. (The neighbors start to complain about a bad odor.)

She finds unlikely allies and learns how to piece together bits of her life by mastering a jigsaw puzzle. Some of the plot twists caught me flat- footed and I'm still smiling over them!

This interesting character study won acclaim at the Berlin Film Festival earlier this year; I can certainly see why.