The Tenant

One stormy night, Ivón and Hugo—perhaps accompanied by Hugo’s son, Carlos—arrive at a hotel in Gijón. They go out to see the rough sea but, soon thereafter, Ivón returns, looking for help because the boy has been dragged out to sea. The body doesn’t turn up though, and the commissioner in charge of the case discovers that many suspicious things had happened at the hotel in the weeks prior to Ivón and Hugo’s arrival. 

The Perezes take their three children and leave the country for a better life in the capital. With little money in hand, they set up in Madrid thanks to Pili, an old friend of the eldest son, who puts them up for money. Each day in the city is a struggle to get by—a very different life from the prosperity they’d imagined. Their hopes to make it respectably are reduced to failed dreams that transform the family members and end up corrupting them.