The MIT Ibero-American Film Series 2022 features five critically acclaimed films by directors from Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, and Guatemala, with a diverse range of Latin American contexts and perspectives, and in Portuguese, Spanish, Kaqchikel Mayan, and English (all with English subtitles).
The Second Mother / Que horas ela volta? (2015, Brazil)
Thursday, April 14, 2022
Room 6-120
7:00 pm brief introduction by Joaquín Terrones
7:15 pm film screening
In-person event. Free and open to the MIT community.
Introduction
Introduction to the film will be made by Joaquín Terrones. Terrones is a lecturer in Literature at MIT.
About the film
A film by Anna Muylaert. In Portuguese with English subtitles. With With Regina Casé, Michel Joelsals, Camila Márdila, Karine Teles, and Lourenço Mutarelli. Run time 1h 52m.
The film centers around Val, a hard- working live-in housekeeper in modern day Sao Paulo. Val is perfectly content to take care of every one of her wealthy employers’ needs, from cooking and cleaning to being a surrogate mother to their teenage son, who she has raised since he was a toddler. But when Val’s estranged daughter Jessica suddenly shows up, the unspoken but intrinsic class barriers that exist within the home are thrown into disarray. Jessica is smart, confident, and ambitious, and refuses to accept the upstairs/downstairs dynamic, testing relationships and loyalties and forcing everyone to reconsider what family really means.
Awards
Brazil’s submission for Best Foreign Language Film to Academy Awards. Winner of numerous awards including from the Berlin International Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, Ljubljana International Film Festival, Women Film Critics Circle, Riverrun International Film Festival, Sao Paulo Association of Art, and more.
About the Series
The MIT Ibero American Film Series 2022 features five critically acclaimed films by directors from Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, and Guatemala with a diverse range of Latin American contexts and perspectives, and in Portuguese, Spanish, Maya, and English (all with English subtitles). The featured films engage with topics such as: the clash between natives and newcomers, urban living, ecological degradation, family relations, and sexuality in a variety of genres: psychological thriller, science fiction, coming of age tale, “mob epic for the ages,” and domestic drama. More information: languages-events@mit.edu
Sponsors
This series was made possible with the support of Global Languages, Committee on Race and Diversity, MindHandHeart, Council for the Arts at MIT.
Thanks also to MISTI; History at MIT; Literature; Latino ERG; Hermanas Unidas; MIT Program in Women’s and Gender Studies; Program in Science, Technology, and Society; Comparative Media Studies/Writing; and MIT Linguistics.
This series is part of the Spanish Film Club, and was made possible with the support of Pragda, SPAIN arts & culture and the Secretary of State for Culture of Spain.
