CinemaSerf

Dec 5, 2023

7.0

I'm not usually fan of children in films, but boy - Naíma Sentíes' performance here as the young "Sol" is terrific. She, replete with multicoloured curly wig is with her mother preparing for a party to celebrate her father's birthday. What we learn from very early on is that her dad "Tona" (Mateo Garcia) is very unwell. Indeed, from the brief scene we see of him in the shower - this is a twenty-seven year old not destined to survive much longer. Clearly that information is known amongst the man's family and friends with his sisters, and his father, taking quite distinctly differing approaches to dealing with their impeding loss. The story takes it's time, but it's never dull. The observational nature of the drama, and the hugely charismatic effort from the young Sentíes is enthralling to watch as their day continues revealing stresses, strops, strains and a slightly defiant degree of optimism. As ensemble performances go, Marisol Gasé, Montserrat Marañon and Teresa Sánchez ensure that this well cast and presented story of a family in distress works evocatively. There are few tantrums, just a stoicism and dignity that makes this really quite a poignant story of a young girl - and a family - that doesn't quite appreciate that life is soon to change for ever.

The everyday lives of average individuals ordinarily might not make for especially engaging storytelling. However, when they’re framed within the context of extraordinary circumstances, they take on an added new dimension, as witnessed in the second offering from Mexican writer-director Lila Avilés. This warm, heartfelt, bittersweet comedy-drama tells the endearing story of a family hosting a birthday party for Tona, a young, beloved painter battling advanced cancer (Mateo Garcia Elizondo), told largely through the perspective of his seven-year-old daughter, Sol (Naíma Sentíes), who hopes against hope for her father’s recovery. As events play out, viewers watch as Tona’s family makes preparations for the celebration – often involving simple tasks told with delightfully funny twists that provide much-needed comic relief – as well as the various means with which his relatives are dealing (or not dealing) with an apparently impending inevitability that no one really wants to address or discuss. Yet what might seem destined to be an exercise in forced festivities with an underlying sense of morbidity turns out to be a loving, earnest celebration of life, despite the undeniable presence of an unwanted, intangible “guest” lingering in the background. While the film incorporates a few sequences that are inherently a little too incidental in nature compared to the larger overall narrative, “Tótem” nevertheless serves up a charming, touching, authentically presented tale that reaches out to audiences and surrounds them with sincere, loving feelings and a big, well-earned hug. This National Board of Review winner and Independent Spirit Award nominee is a fine, little-known indie gem that will surely move you, even if it leaves you with uncomfortably mixed feelings as its story unfolds. It effectively illustrates that there indeed can be times of boundless, overwhelming joy even in the face of overwhelming lament but that what ultimately matters most is what we make of these circumstances when they play out, especially when it comes to expressing how we feel for those whom we truly care about most.

Summary: 9/10: Lila Avilés and her extraordinary cast, led by Naíma Sentíes, create a slice-of-life and deeply humanistic portrait of family that finds hilarity, sadness, and love in the daily rhythms of a crowded Mexican household. Lila Avilés' Totem is a hilarious and heartbreaking slice-of-life that captures something most Westerners will find utterly alien: a crowded house full of family, the beautiful chaos of multiple generations living on top of each other, aunts and cousins and grandparents all moving through the same space with the fluid madness that comes from long practice. The film follows seven-year-old Sol (Naíma Sentíes) as she spends a day at her grandfather's house, where her family is preparing a surprise birthday party for her father, Tona. Avilés captures the rhythm of this household perfectly. In one scene, little Esther, a pre-school cousin, sits perched on top of the refrigerator with a cat, and it doesn't feel staged or symbolic; it just feels like the kind of thing that happens when space is limited and children find their own physics. The title carries a double meaning. The word comes from the Ojibwe, where it represents family, clan, or tribe - and this is certainly a film about the bonds that hold families together when everything else threatens to tear them apart. But for the Indigenous peoples in Mexico, totem can mean spirit guide, and Avilés shows us that life exists on two planes: life in this crazy, crowded, noisy world, and life in another world that presses close to it, that the family acknowledges without naming directly. The scene where a woman comes to rid the house of the bad spirits is just a master-stroke that had us in stitches. The acting, especially from Naíma Sentíes, is phenomenal. She plays Sol with the particular emotional intelligence of children who've had to grow up faster than they should, who understand more than the adults realize but less than they need to. The captures are intimate without feeling invasive, the pacing deliberate without dragging, the narrative elliptical but always clear about what matters. This is deeply humanistic filmmaking, the kind that trusts audiences to find meaning in observation, that understands a crowded kitchen before a party tells you everything you need to know about love and denial and hope and desperation operating simultaneously in the same space. The film won the National Board of Review award and was Mexico's entry for Best International Feature Film. Avilés refuses melodrama even when the subject invites it. She gives us family as it actually exists: messy, funny, frustrating, necessary, alive with the kind of love that expresses itself through action rather than declaration, through showing up and making food and arguing about decorations and pretending everything will be fine when everyone knows it won't.