Carol, a 12-year-old Spanish-American girl from New York, travels with her mother to Spain in the spring of 1938, at the height of the Civil War. Separated from her beloved father, Carol arrives in her mother's home village and transforms the secretive family environment. Her innocence and rebellious nature drive her at first to reject a world that is at once new and foreign. But she soon journeys into adulthood through a friendship with village teacher Maruja and young local boy Tomiche.—Film Movement
The feature is as much a historical snap shot of Spain during the Civil War, prior to Franco's assent as it is a tale of love in a time where the lines between good and evil seemed to be a lot clearer than the current times. Carol (Claro Lago) comes to Spain with her mother Aurora ( Maria Barranco) to their homeland where their father Robert, an American (Ben Temple) is helping to fight Franco's military regime near Madrid. They settle into a small town of Aurora's birth, living with a grandfather and forming bonds with old and new friends. Aurora has come here to die (of an illness no one is made clearly aware of) and leave Carol in the hands of her sister and father. The plot livens up as love blossoms between Carol and Tomiche (Juan Jose Ballesta) and as a love of daughter for a father becomes evident. Towards the end, it becomes clear that the Franco regime has won and her father desprately seeks his daughter as a fugitive in the "new Spain". The end is tragic as Tomiche dies and Carol's father is captured but hope still exists that Carol and her father will be reunited.
