Kika

Kika, a naïve makeup artist, recalls meeting Ramón, a fashion photographer, and receiving a phone call from his American stepfather, Nicholas Pierce. Nicholas explains that he’s not calling for sex but to help stage the younger man’s corpse. The conversation hints at a web of voyeurism, desire, and looming danger surrounding their lives.

Ramón, who harbors voyeuristic tendencies, proposes marriage to Kika. She accepts, but her joy is tempered by guilt because she has been cheating on him with Nicholas. The couple’s future is shadowed by multiple entanglements, including the unspoken presence of Nicholas.

Nicholas works on a novel about a lesbian serial killer while freelancing for an exploitative TV show about bizarre events. The show is devised and presented by Andrea Caracortada, who used to be Ramón’s psychologist and lover. Ramón reveals that Andrea scarred her own face when he left her, and that she now stalks him.

Paul Bazzo, a dim-witted former porn actor jailed for rapes, escapes during a religious procession and makes his way to Ramón and Kika’s flat. Juana, their maid, instructs him to tie Kika up, knock her unconscious, and steal valuables, before hiding at a cousin’s place. Paul rapes Kika at knife point, escalating the danger in the couple’s home.

An unseen voyeur alerts the police to the crime. Two incompetent inspectors arrive, shoot at the door, and barely interrupt the rape before Paul escapes. The chaotic intervention adds to the sense of vulnerability surrounding Kika.

Paul bumps into Andrea, who is wearing a futuristic reporter’s outfit and a helmet-mounted camera, and she tries to interview him. He pushes her away and steals her motorcycle. She then enters the flat and harasses Kika, leaving the police puzzled by her sudden presence.

Andrea credits an unknown peeping tom for alerting her and broadcasts footage of the rape on her show, causing Kika to break down. The broadcast weaponizes trauma and amplifies the communal sense of surveillance.

Kika finds Ramón unable to help and overhears him confess to Nicholas that he called the police because he liked peeping from his studio window. Juana, the maid, confesses her part in the rape as well, adding guilt to the aftermath.

Ramón, having kept his mother’s diaries, reads them after Nicholas returns to Casa Youkali and discovers that the farewell letter Nicholas passed on was ripped from an old entry. He confronts Nicholas and accuses him of murdering his mother.

Andrea and Ramón spy on the flat from separate addresses. Andrea realizes Nicholas may have murdered one of his girlfriends, Susana, and she travels to Casa Youkali armed with a pistol, uncovering a freshly dug grave in the garden.

Nicholas barricades himself inside; Andrea breaks in, proposes an interview and a quick escape before broadcast. A violent confrontation ensues, and they shoot each other.

In his dying moments, Nicholas confesses that his novel about a lesbian serial killer was really a disguised autobiography. Andrea has pieced together the truth behind his fiction.

Kika discovers the bodies of Andrea, Susana and Ramón and revives Ramón with electric shocks, a second resurrection after his earlier shock. Ramón is taken to hospital, and Kika, suddenly free of the previous entanglements, picks up a stranded driver and hints she might pursue a new direction.