Chris Knipp Writing: Movies, Politics, Art


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PostPosted: Wed Aug 26, 2015 6:38 am 
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REGINA CASÉ AND MICHEL JOELSAS IN THE SECOND MOTHER

Family and class rearrangements in São Paolo

The aim of the Brazilian film The Second Mother is obvious and its themes are familiar, but that doesn't keep it from being deftly executed fun with a finely crafted scene and nice character portraits. Its subject is class, its obvious main focus Val, (popular TV star Regina Casé), a warm-hearted, eager-to-please live-in maid who has served for over a decade in a bourgeois São Paolo household. Val's central role, and much else, will be upset when her long-estranged daughter comes to stay.

Val has raised her employers' 18-year-old son, Fabinho (Michel Joelsas), whom she adores, and holds the disjointed family together. It's clear how essential she is when we see Fabinho, his born-rich dad Carlos (Lourenço Mutarelli), and his self-made mom Barbara (Karine Teles) at the dinner table. Their eyes are all on their smart phones. Val's individual attentions to each of them are what provide a semblance of unifying warmth in the household. Typically in such classic farce-friendly situations, Val is "almost" a member of the family: her servile language offsets her constant risk of over-familiarity. When Val's daughter Jéssica (Camila Mardila) arrives, planning to apply to FAU, the local university's prestigious school of architecture and urbanism, her presence alters the dynamic, including attraction and disruption of both males and a total disturbance of Val's sense of the proper order of things.

Jéssica is smart and bold and absolutely refuses to adopt her mother's servile status in the household. Eschewing a mattress on mom's basement maid's room, Jéssica asks for the house's big guest room for her stay, and gets it. Though Barbara shows hints of discomfort with the democratic reception they're giving Jéssica, she's ostensibly playing along, even fixing Jéssica's breakfast the first morning. This after Fabinho has spent the night cuddling with Val. He can be and is more babyish with his surrogate mom than he could with a real one, and comes for the affection Barbara doesn't give him. So these are portraits by contrasts and opposites. Fabianho is taking the university entrance exams the same day when Jéssica will take a preliminary one, and this day becomes a pivot point of the plot.

That's the setup, supported by the handsome cinematography and a modern house and pool that modestly exude wealth. If Val is the house's unifying element and chief engine of human warmth, Jéssica is the engine that disrupts the social order. But though her function is Teorema-like, this is no Teorema. It flirts with farce, but ends with a feel-good resolution in which Mardila and Casé both shine, but the picture ultimately belongs to Casé. Along the way the characters of Fabihho, Barbara, and Carlos, though less rounded, are confidently drawn. Mutarelli is particularly droll as the oddball rich guy. The charismatic and cuddly Joelsas was a child star, making his debut as the young lead of The Year My Parents Went on Vacation, co-written by Muylaert. Though a relative newcomer, Camila Mardila holds her own opposite the veteran Casé.

The original Portuguese title, which translates as "When Is She Coming Back?", is an allusion to the way Barbara (as we see in a flashback) was constantly leaving Fabinho in Val's hands when he was a child. But it could also refer to Jéssica, who similarly felt abandoned by Val when she was left to be raised by her father and stepmother. Anna Muylaert's film might play well as a double feature with Chilean director Sebastian Silva’s 2009 The Maid, with Silva's dry character study of a grumpy house servant providing a dramatic contrast to Muylaert's portrait of the affectionate Val.

Second Mother/Que horas ela volta? 112 mins., debuted at Sundance January 2015, where Regina Casesé won a prize and Muylaert received a nomination; the film and director won the audience award at Berlin; over a dozen international festivals. Release in France 24 June, very well received (AlloCiné press rating 3.8). In the US raves (Metacritic 86%, but based on only 7 reviews.) Distributed in the US by Oscilloscope with 28 August 2015 release. Laemmle Theater Los Angeles 28 Aug., San Francisco 4 Sept.
Selected by Brazil to be its Best Foreign Oscar submission.
Trailer 1.
Trailer 2.

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©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.


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