I had high expectations for this movie as it generated a lot of buzz for winning the Caméra d'Or at Cannes, however, upon watching the movie you slowly realize that this film is not really about the indigenous mothers who fell victim to the Guatemalan armed conflict, but rather about a young man who works as an anthropologist that has a personal stake for helping these women who are searching for the remains of their loved ones. He only helps them because he is looking for the remains of his father, all while his own mother tries to deter him from searching for his father as she's keeping a secret from him.
The film is beautifully shot, there is a sequence where the the women are photographed while providing their testimonies which is beautiful, but as I stated previously, the film fails to amplify the voices that give it its title and it failed to do so because it was told through the wrong point of view. It reminds me a little bit of The Help and how Skeeter, a white woman, is the protagonist in a story about black maids suffering from racism. Here you have Ernesto, a male looking for his father's remains, taking center stage in what should be a story about the suffering of these women.
"Mi Padre" would've been a more appropriate title.
The film is beautifully shot, there is a sequence where the the women are photographed while providing their testimonies which is beautiful, but as I stated previously, the film fails to amplify the voices that give it its title and it failed to do so because it was told through the wrong point of view. It reminds me a little bit of The Help and how Skeeter, a white woman, is the protagonist in a story about black maids suffering from racism. Here you have Ernesto, a male looking for his father's remains, taking center stage in what should be a story about the suffering of these women.
"Mi Padre" would've been a more appropriate title.