Suddenly Cristina becomes Sofia.... Some things we take for granted. We take comfort in knowing who we are and where we came from. Of course, some people aren’t so lucky and for them life is a series of discoveries filled with uncertain mystery and pain.

“Cautiva” is a delicate film about a young girl’s journey into uncertainty. This Argentinean effort smartly focuses on its protagonist’s struggle with abruptly being caught between two families both who love her and want desperately for her to return their love. It is a mature take on a struggle taking place we are told even today in Argentina. This is a film so careful and believable it is not surprising that it is based on actual events.

Cristina has just turned 15 years old. She lives with her affluent parents in Buenos Aires and has many friends. One day, as Christina sits quietly in a class at a strict Catholic school, she is directed to go with a nun to the head office. We patiently follow her from one office to another (through a maze of hallways it seems) until she is told the news by a federal judge. Suddenly, Cristina become Sofia and she is informed that her parents are not her parents, rather, her real (meaning biological) parents were political prisoners of a former military dictatorship. Cristina doesn’t want to be Sofia, she just wants to go home but where is home and who are the people who raised her?

“Cautiva” plays things pretty straight up. Unlike the treatment this material would have been given in Hollywood (“The Deep End of the Ocean” comes to mind), writer/director/producer Gaston Biraben makes a small film about a big subject. When you think about it, the displacement of children is a consequence of oppressive regimes and political instability all over the world. How many children live among us oblivious to the fact that the people they think are their parents are merely loving substitutes?

“Cautiva” does not attempt to demonize either family (the real and the adopted). There is an allusion to the possibility that Cristina’s illegally adoptive father may have been involved with the military dictatorship and is now protected by specific laws. But the heart of this movie is a little girl’s fight with feelings of regret and uncertainty. Cristina is pressed into a new identity that changes everything even her name.

To be honest, I felt that liberties were taken in “Cautiva” to move the plot along a bit too conveniently in places. For example, Cristina finds kinship with another displaced young girl who leads her to secrets that help Cristina understand more about how she came into this world. Although I thought that this new friend was wasted more or less as a plot device, there is an intense scene in which the two girls stand before one another in the school community shower and they realize that their sad bond may be the only thing they can trust. They are part of an extended family. It is the agony of lost children and the one certainty in the midst of so much doubt.

The story as told is almost too small in that much time is spent on Cristina’s inner fight to reconcile her feelings. The secrets of her past are less important to the filmmaker than Cristina’s agony. For the most part this works but it makes it play slow in places in a way American mainstream audiences don’t typically appreciate. Of course, this is a film for thinkers and not one for people who want only to be blindly entertained. I was shocked by the revelations of Cristina’s past and I cared for her enough to watch her slide uncomfortably into her new existence. Much of the success of the film depends on the solid empathic performance by Barbara Lombardo as Cristina turned Sofia. Lombardo doesn’t play her character as a winy crybaby but as a budding young woman whose world has been shattered.

2003 must be the year of the tween. So many good films have been released this year about young girls who are saddled with a myriad of authentic problems. The list includes: “Bend It Like Beckham,” “The Magdalene Sisters,” “Thirteen,” “Purgatory House,” and now “Cautiva.” Each of these movies feature strong stories and even stronger performances by the young female stars. Here Barbara Lombardo plays Cristina/Sofia with a wide-eyed innocence that narrows as the story progresses. She transforms softly from a reserved girl seated in the back of her proper Catholic school classroom into a strong young woman who seeks out answers by using her wits and raising her voice. Like the other films mentioned above, the director tightens his focus on his young star her thoughts and solutions.

When the foundations of your existence are shaken, what can you believe, who can you trust? Cristina will never quite be Sofia but after her past is revealed to her, she will never again be only Cristina. “Cautiva” makes us question the things we take for granted.

Jonathan W. Hickman, 2003