Irene explains that she found her husband in bed with another woman and started the fire that killed them both. Irene tells Raimunda that she did not know about the abuse until Aunt Paula told her about it, and never forgave herself for not noticing it. The reason for Raimunda and Irene's estrangement is that Raimunda's father sexually abused her, resulting in the birth of Paula thus, Paula is Raimunda's daughter and her sister. Irene admits that she did not, in fact, die in the fire, and reveals the whole truth. Sole reaveals to Raimunda that she has seen their mother's ghost, who is in the next room with Paula. The next night, Agustina comes to the restaurant, and reveals two startling secrets: her mother and Raimunda's father were having an affair, and her mother disappeared on the same day that Raimunda's parents died.
While staying in Sole's apartment, Paula meets her grandmother's ghost and grows close to her. Raimunda leaves Paula with Sole, rents a van and transports the freezer to a convenient spot by the river Júcar. Agustina hopes that the ghost will be able to tell her about her own mother, who disappeared three years before. Agustina asks Raimunda if she has seen her mother's ghost. Agustina is diagnosed with terminal cancer and goes to Madrid for treatment. Raimunda reveals to Paula that Paco was not her biological father, promising to tell her the whole story later. Irene questions why Raimunda hates her and is fearful of revealing her presence to Raimunda. Irene agrees to pose as a Russian immigrant who doesn't speak any Spanish. Sole agrees to let Irene stay with her and assist her with clients for her illicit hair salon, which she operates out of her apartment.
Sole encounters her mother's ghost herself, and when she returns to Madrid, she discovers that the ghost has stowed away in the trunk of her car. Aunt Paula's neighbour Agustina ( Blanca Portillo) confesses to Sole that she has heard Paula talking to the ghost of their mother Irene ( Carmen Maura). Meanwhile, Sole returns for the funeral of her elderly and dementia-stricken Aunt Paula ( Chus Lampreave). When members of a film crew happen upon the restaurant, Raimunda strikes a deal to cater for them, and finds herself back in the restaurant business. Raimunda hides the corpse in the deep-freezer of a nearby restaurant with an absent owner, Emilio (Carlos Blanco). When he attempts to rape Paula, claiming that he is not really her father, Paula stabs him to death in self-defense. Raimunda and her daughter Paula ( Yohana Cobo) live with Paula's father Paco ( Antonio de la Torre). Their parents had died in a fire three years before. Raimunda ( Penélope Cruz) and Sole ( Lola Dueñas) are sisters who grew up in Alcanfor de las Infantas, a small village in La Mancha, but now both live in Madrid. Cruz was nominated for the 2006 Academy Award for Best Actress, making her the first Spanish woman ever to be nominated in that category. The film's Spanish premiere was held on 10 March 2006 in Puertollano, Spain, where the filming had taken place. It received critical acclaim and ultimately won two awards at the festival, for Best Actress (shared by the six main actresses) and Best Screenplay. Volver premiered at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival, where it competed for the Palme d'Or. Set in the La Mancha region, Almodóvar's place of birth, the filmmaker cited his upbringing as a major influence on many aspects of the plot and the characters. Drawing inspiration from the Italian neorealism of the late 1940s to early 1950s and the work of pioneering directors such as Federico Fellini, Luchino Visconti, and Pier Paolo Pasolini, Volver addresses themes like sexual abuse, loneliness and death, mixing the genres of farce, tragedy, melodrama, and magic realism. The plot originates in Almodóvar's earlier film The Flower of My Secret (1995), where it features as a novel which is rejected for publication but is stolen to form the screenplay of a film named The Freezer. To top off the family crisis, her mother Irene returns from the dead to tie up loose ends. Revolving around an eccentric family of women from a wind-swept region south of Madrid, Cruz stars as Raimunda, a working-class woman forced to go to great lengths to protect her 14-year-old daughter Paula. The film features an ensemble cast that also includes Penélope Cruz, Carmen Maura, Lola Dueñas, Blanca Portillo, Yohana Cobo, and Chus Lampreave. Volver ( Spanish pronunciation:, meaning "to go back") is a 2006 Spanish comedy-drama film written and directed by Pedro Almodóvar.