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Memory, eroticism, and politics get intangibly intertwined in the aptly titled Chaotic Ana, the long-awaited new feature from Spanish auteur Julio Medem.

Accepting an invitation from an arts patron, Justine (Charlotte Rampling), wannabe painter Ana (Manuela Vellés) leaves the cave home she shares with her father in Ibiza to move to an artist’s commune in Madrid. But while embracing her new life among her young artist friends and finding love in the process, Ana soon starts to see visions of events that she hasn’t lived. When she eventually flips out and undergoes hypnosis, it’s found that her subconscious consists of memories from the lives of other young women throughout history, all of whom met their tragic death at the age of 22 under the tyranny of man.

As a loving tribute to the director’s painter sister, Ana Medem, who died at 22 in a car accident on the way to her own exhibition (and whose paintings have been adapted for the film), Chaotic Ana’s concern for women’s suffering and its portrayal of an eternal consciousness are both poignant and bewitching.

Unfortunately, the film’s impact slowly fades with its random and inconsequential latter parts, when Ana embarks on a road-movie-style cross-continent journey, with characters drifting in and out of the story for no apparent reason. And in a move that may divide even the most assiduous Medem fans, the film culminates with a misguided political statement that seems both inapt and superficial.

Although Medem’s trademark mystical, dream-like storytelling is still apparent in this film, its numerous missteps will likely relegate it to just a minor entry in the director’s overall oeuvre. Edmund Lee

Dir Julio Medem, 2007, Category III, 118 mins, Screenings on Sun 17 and Tue 26