Bad Living (2023)

Bad Living is the kind of intimate, sharply observed drama that makes you feel like you’ve stepped into a real place and can’t quite find the exit—a weathered seaside hotel where history clings to the walls and every conversation carries an old bruise. João Canijo’s direction turns domestic tension into a slow, magnetic current, drawing you deeper into a family ecosystem where love and resentment coexist with unnerving realism. The performances are the film’s quiet thunder: layered, lived-in, and fearless, capturing how bitterness can become a language passed down through generations. It’s not a comfort watch—this is a psychologically immersive experience that asks you to sit with discomfort—but if you’re on the fence and crave complex human drama that lingers in the mind, it’s absolutely worth the stay.

Bad Living is aiming for a claustrophobic, generational chamber drama where a decaying seaside hotel becomes a pressure cooker for old grudges and suffocating family dynamics. The problem is it can feel punishingly slow and relentlessly bleak, with such a cold, gloomy tone that the tragedy may land more as endurance than catharsis. If you need emotional warmth, clear psychological motivation, or even a flicker of hope to stay engaged, this one will likely frustrate you—especially with its dark, murky look and heavy pacing. That said, viewers who appreciate austere, mood-first European dramas and don’t mind sitting in discomfort may find its atmosphere and controlled performances quietly compelling.