Tótem

PL: Tótem

Director: Lila Avilés

Script: Lila Avilés

Cinematography: Diego Tenorio

Editing: Omar Guzmán

Producers: Tatiana Graullera, Lila Avilés, Louise Riousse

Cast: Naíma Sentíes, Monserrat Marañon, Marisol Gasé, Saori Gurza, Teresita Sánchez

Mexico, Denmark, France 2023
95′

Dazzling and awarded at the Berlinale with the Ecumenical Jury Prize, this film encompasses the entire universe within a single day and a single house. It presents the perspective of seven-year-old Sol, who finds herself in the midst of nerve-wracking preparations for a special family celebration. Someone drinks too much, a cake gets burnt, a woman from the neighborhood banishes evil spirits, and a seemingly innocent exchange of words provokes an outburst. Sol explores the house full of nooksintricacies, feeling a bit bored, she eavesdrops a bit, and eagerly awaits the moment when she can see her father, hidden somewhere upstairs. From fragments of everyday life, from the way light penetrates the cluttered house, from the choreography of crises, and from children’s observations, Mexican filmmaker Lila Avilés constructs her totem: a cinematic myth, a portrait of an ancestor, images that connect the living with the spirits. The intimate perspective subtly expands, and the familial chaos paradoxically becomes part of a larger order in the world, where life and death naturally follow one another in parallel, where storms and tranquility alternate, and where tragedies both destroy and bind together.