Ma Ma

This barmy Spanish weepie is like that game where someone writes a sentence on a piece of paper, folds it over and passes it on. Pah to logic and believability! Penélope Cruz stars as Magda, a primary school teacher in Madrid who accepts her diagnosis of invasive breast cancer with a saintly smile.

Right after leaving the hospital with the news, Magda meets a football scout watching her son play. A call interrupts their conversation – his wife and daughter have been involved in a terrible car accident. What happens next? What doesn’t happen next? Life, death, birth, hugs and a singing gynaecologist. Cruz has enough charm to melt a glacier, but she can’t rescue the shamelessly sentimental script by director Julio Medem (‘Sex and Lucia’). ‘Ma Ma’ is going for the heartstrings, but don’t bother taking tissues.