Rebecca Lenkiewicz’s Hot Milk, the film adaptation of the 2016 British novel, examines the tension between a mother and daughter as they visit a Greek wellness clinic. The tension has always been there, as Sofia (Emma Mackey) seems to bite her tongue when her mother Rose (Fiona Shaw) laments the woes of daily living. Their trip to Greece is not quite a vacation; financed through their house mortgage, Rose is hoping to find an explanation for the illness that has rendered her legs immobile. While her mind and voice speak in the way that middle-aged women often do in any space, the unspoken stress of caretaking lies on Sofia, who had dropped out of college but has not relented to the idea that she might have to care of her mother for the rest of her life – not yet, anyways.
As the book accentuates the heat of the Spanish summer, the film perfectly encapsulates the dreariness of this trip. Filmed in Greece, the direction steers away from the beautiful blue water of the Mykonos shores and right into the rather cold concrete structures of crowded boxy residencies and the clinic, in which Sofia seems to walk around as if there is consistent debris under her soles. Make no mistake: this would not be on the itinerary for any international tourist. The beach located nearby often emits a heat haze, as if we stumbled upon the edge of a desert. Sometimes it seems like we might be witnessing a mirage, especially when older stranger Ingrid (Vicky Krieps, fully committed as a sunburnt free spirit) first appears on a horse.
The film’s sequential fragments mostly work; as Rose’s care is delegated under Dr. Gomez (Vincent Perez) and his daughter Julieta (Patsy Ferran), Sofia ventures into daytime reveries, culminating in a sexual tryst with Ingrid. Though the relationship doesn’t seem permanently promising, their twilight connections are so intimate that we almost think they will make it to see the sun. Nonetheless, Ingrid’s sweet nothings of vacationing together at Christmas are negated by her other publicly displayed romances with men, at least in Sofia’s eyes. For a movie where little movement occurs, the story can feel jumpy when a character says something out of the blue (“I killed someone,” Ingrid blankly states without context — also having killed the mood) or when Sophie decides to go see her father after an 11-year-absence.
Not unlike her character in Sex Education, Mackey’s Sofia is believable as a person with potential, burdened with responsibility that cannot be unloaded to anyone else. She is young enough to still talk of a tangible future, yet mature enough to not be completely naïve to the way relationships and possibilities may roll out. While it’s not unbelievable that Sofia maintains herself well for someone who spends time fetching water for her mom all the time, I’m not sure how long she has been taking care of her mom, and whether the course of her life has been coming in and out of the caregiver role. Fiona Shaw’s usual restrained performance works in a physical sense, and she can project the overbearing mother from the comfort of her wheelchair. We can’t hate her, partly because we know older folks like her and partly because whenever the camera switches onto Rose, it often shares an expression of smallness where it seems cruel to be mad.
Hot Milk is too short to root for a single resolution, whether it’s Sofia and Ingrid (though their time together is sometimes portrayed in beautiful lighting – please take note of the scene where Ingrid is completely covered in the dark during a particular rendezvous so much that she looks like a two-dimensional shadow against a moonlit Sophie), Sofia and Rose, or just Sofia. Even so, the audience won’t feel lost in what happens. Even with the missing pieces, the last act becomes surprisingly climactic when Sofia, finding herself truly alone in her emotions, starts to bark back at the enclosing, nightmarish loneliness.
In one scene, Sofia explains that flexibility is the ability to stretch anywhere, but elasticity is the ability to return back to form. As intelligent and emotionally muddled Sofia feels, she is also a simple person: to feel loved and cared for. It’s not a surprise that she takes to Ingrid’s attention, but is able to shut off when it doesn’t feel right. The thing about being elastic is that while you return home, you might not be in the same original shape.
Hot Milk
2025
dir. Rebecca Lenkiewicz
93 min.
Opens Friday, 6/27 @ AMC Boston Common and Alamo Drafthouse Boston Seaport
