Film Review: LOS DÍAS LIBRES: A Fascinating Glimpse at a Young Girl and Lucid Dreaming Amidst Harsh Realities [Locarno 2026]

Los Días Libres Review

Los Días Libres / The Days Off (2026) Film Review from the 79th Annual Locarno Film Festival, a movie written and directed by Lucila Mariani and starring Antonia Robolini, Laura Paredes, Luiza Quinteiro, Guillermo Berthold, Jenni Merla, Gaia Garibaldi and Bruna Sigal.  

Los Días Libres is an intriguing drama about a young 12-year old girl named Bego (Antonia Robolini) and her experiences that help shape the joys and sorrows of her current situation. This film zeroes in on lucid dreaming, a concept that was first revealed in a mainstream manner as a major theme in Vanilla Sky back in 2001. For anyone unfamiliar with the concept, it’s where you pick your perfect, ideal scenarios and experience them while your body stays put in one particular place. Los Días Libres offers situations that are relatable so it’s easy to understand why Bego yearns to escape the mundane situations she becomes accustomed to.

One of Begot’s frustrations is her parents’ dire financial situation. While the dad (Guillermo Berthold) drives for an Uber-type service, her mom (Laura Paredes) suffers at home with her own personal problems. Bego tries to find her own way, but there are obstacles to her doing that. Bego becomes intrigued by a solar eclipse that is featured on the news which could lead to the possibility of people freezing and becoming “eclipsed” as it is occurring. Luiza Quinteiro serves as REN__, who helps introduce the idea of shifting. That’s a concept where people can find their inner desires in a very peculiar and fascinating way.

Several of the young characters in this film walk or lay around in shorts which solidifies the temperatures felt in the summer. Meanwhile, the movie ably captures the potential power outages of the season as well as the loneliness associated with trying to find someone on a similar wavelength as a young person such as Bego.

Bego is a sympathetic character and the scenes where she drives around with her dad can be heartbreaking as she wishes the car to stop beeping whenever a potential passenger is available, but the father tells her (more or less) that he may need the ride for him to earn money so she must understand that. There’s also the matter of the mother as well whose unfortunate predicament is sad for Bego to behold.

The director seems to believe the movie opens up the world of the internet and the possibilities it exposes a young person to through shifting. These are exciting concepts and the movie is very abstract which makes what one brings to the cinematic experience very personal as well. This film is quite accomplished in terms of the way it creates its own worlds (both real and imagined) which it immerses the viewer in quite satisfactorily.

There are two standout performances. Of course, Berthold gets some commanding moments as the struggling dad and does a fine job in the role, making us understand his detachment from his family quite well. This is ultimately Antonio Robolini’s movie, though, and the actress is quite noteworthy for bringing a fair amount of integrity to the central character of the film. Robolini is dedicated and the performance shines through significantly thanks to the vulnerability that the actress brings to the part.

This movie probably won’t be remembered for its acting as much as for its splendid visuals, however. This film creates a crisp picture of the realities of life in terms of their deep complexities. Vanilla Sky was a movie that messed with the viewer’s mind in confusing ways. This movie isn’t trying to do that as much as it attempts to open up the possibility of understanding the concept of lucid dreaming. This new film also has a small budget and can be more of a calling card for the director to show the possibilities of what could be brought to the equation with a bigger budget.

Los Días Libres is called The Days Off in English. That title makes a lot of sense because the time that one is away from reality while lucid dreaming is centered in an alternate world which can actually become a personal reality. Filmmaker Lucila Mariani has a lot to say and a limited platform to do it here because of the film’s low budget and brief running time of less than an hour and a half. Still, this film should be commended for saying so much about the experience of growing up in a time where the internet could make such an impact on  a young person’s life. This movie is very much a good one, for its impressive imagery and acting but it leaves the viewer begging to see what Lucila Mariani could do with a bigger budget.

Rating: 7/10

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