A caustic portrait simultaneously savage and subtle, of the American family as the centre of society, featuring the dining room table as the ultimate theatrical stage, a theatre of war. Dinner in a house where the ceiling literally threatens to collapse on the characters is the pretext for Antonio Campos’ provocative analysis of its members. In the first scene, the youngest son commits suicide by shooting himself at the table. The clock goes back 15 minutes - the duration of the film - to show in real time what happened in those last moments. The characters are presented through small vignettes, in which subtitles tell us about how much they make per year, how much they spend per month, and their accumulated debt. This ever present invisible hierarchy, commands the action, and contaminates the interaction between characters. Above all, the film suggests a likely destiny for the newest member of the family, reflected in the various people sitting at the table. (JA)