(Ecuador, 108 min.)
Written and directed by Tania Hermida
Starring: Eva Mayu Mecham Benavides, Markus Mecham Benavides,
Martina León, Sebastián Hormachea, Francisco Jaramillo, Paul Curillo, Juana
Estrella, Pancho Aguirre.
The future looks bright according to In the Name of the Girl (En
el nombre de la hija). Girl,
which screens in Ottawa on Friday as part of the ongoing Latin American Film
Festival, offers a tale of tomorrow's leaders with its sweet story about a
young girl empowered by a critical mind. Girl
is really a take on today's leaders, for the film takes place in a fateful
summer of 1976 Ecuador and looks to the future. The film, like the festival's
recent screening of Habanaststion,
foresees a world in which kids learn from the mistakes of past generations and
work together to make a better tomorrow.
In the Name of the
Girl and Habanastation go hand in
hand with their propaganda-infused playtime, but neither film should really be
called a kids' movie, for that might diminish their charms. Every good
fable or bedtime story requires a morale over which the kids may mull when they
go to bed, and Girl appropriately
leaves moviegoers wondering why systems exists to keep people on different
plains.
Manuela, played by Eva Mayu Mecham Benavides, is the
strong-willed girl who becomes a young leader in the film. The twelve-year-old
Manuela experiences an eye-opening glimpse of Ecuador's bougie upper crust when
her parents leave her and her brother, Camilo (played (Eva Mayu Mecham
Benavides’ offscreen brother Markus) at their grandmother's ranch for the
summer while they go off on some top-secret mission in the jungle. (More on that
later.) Juana Estrella plays Grandma Lola with likable curmudgeonliness, but summer
on Grandma Lola's ranch is hardly a siesta, for Manuela confronts a little
microcosm of social stratification when she discovers that granny openly
allows, if not encourages, her grandchildren to shun and belittle the servant's
son who helps at the ranch.
The boy, played by Paul Curillo, is named Andres, but the
cousins call him Pepe since Manuela’s cousin Andres (Sebastián Hormachea) gets
first dibs to the name and he doesn't want another Andres cramping his style at
the ranch. The kids also call Pepe 'the louse' (as does Grandma Lola) because
they think he had a dirty face. Class and racial divides are rampant on the
ranch, and bigoted Grandma Lola preps her grandkids to grow up with backwards
morals.
Grandma Lola also happens to be God-fearing Bible Thumper,
which clashes greatly with Manuela's avowed atheism. Manuela questions Grandma
Lola's preaching and she plays the role of the inquisitive philosopher when the
other kids—mainly Manuela’s tattle-tale cousin Maria Paz (Martina León)—go
through the contradictory motions of shunning Pepe yet gabbing on about love
and forgiveness. The summertime adventure gets another spin when the kids
discover that their grandparents keep their mentally ill son locked in a lab
and send Pepe to feed him scraps as one does a dungeon baby in cartoons. The
family is full of double standards and secrets, and each one offers Manuela a
step towards becoming a headstrong and outspoken leader of tomorrow.
In the Name of the
Girl is a subtle, natural, and realistic film driven by plot, character,
and substance. Director Tania Hermida displays a natural hand at minimal aesthetics
and she boldly relies on her cast of very young actors to carry the film. She
mostly succeeds, as the kids bring a playful innocence to the roles. It feels as
if none of them, even Manuela, truly grasps the gravity of the words they
speak. Nor should they, really, because pre-adolescent kids shouldn't be worrying
about being the next Che Guevara when they could be having fun.
Hermida, however, makes clear that the power of Manuela’s
intuitiveness—the girl is wise beyond her years—has an unmistakable socialist
undertone. Snoopy Maria Paz, for example, finds a treasured picture that
Manuela keeps at her bedside table. It’s of Che and his peers helping the
masses. Manuela even gets a bit of socialism in her blood when bratty Andres
finds a newspaper clipping that reveals what Manuela’s parents are actually
doing: They’re—gasp!—in Bogota learning about heart surgery so they may improve
medical care when they return home. All this information pits Manuela as a foil
for her old guard grandparents.
In the Name of the Girl uses the pleasant youthfulness of the
production to challenge some longstanding ideals. These social constructions
and divides of class seem rather pitiless if even a child can recognize their
artifice and emptiness. It’s a point that could not be made with mature actors,
yet Hermida’s choice to let the power of the film hinge on making her actors
both characters and symbols grants In the
Name of the Girl its progressive authority.
Hermida then does something surprising with the political
thread of In the Name of the Girl.
She challenges it. This challenge appears towards the end of the film when
Manuela decides to lead her cousins on a hungry strike to protest their
grandparents’ actions. The kids stop eating; they make signs; and they act like
little rebels. Nobody is there to listen, though, as Pepe’s mother observes
while the snacks she prepared go to waste. All Manuela’s forward-thinking therefore
seems pitiless if the people in power are at such a remove from their underlings
that communication and debate seem moot. There’s a tangible spirit of hope that
leaves the ranch, though, when summer ends. In
the Name of the Girl is a pleasantly subtle story about one generation’s
ability to reshape the world, and part of its accurate realism is utter
difficulty of changing old ways.
Rating: ★★★½ (out of ★★★★★)
In the Name of the Girl screens in Ottawa at the Latin American
Film Festival on Friday, April 11 at 7:00 pm at Library and Archives Canada.
Update: Girl screens again on June 7 at 7:00 pm as part of the Ecuador Film Series.
Update: Girl screens again on June 7 at 7:00 pm as part of the Ecuador Film Series.
