‘La maternal’ by Pilar Palomero: no one is preparing you for this

‘rootstock’ ★★★

Address Pilar Palomero

interpreters Carla Quílez, Àngela Cervantes, Jordan Dumes, Pepe Lorente, Olga Hueso, Rubén Martínez, Gal-la Sabate, Neus Pàmies

premiere 17 November 2022

Second feature film Pilar Palomero after being rewarded ‘Girls’ It is not a product that blends fiction and non-fiction, but it uses documentary film techniques very well within a representative story. The institution that gives the film its name is a center for underage pregnant women. In the first sequences, 14-year-old Carla, who argues with her boyfriend at the roadside restaurant where they live and also with her young single mother, acts like a common subject. When Carla arrived at La Maternal and never left, loft has the virtue of ripping off half a dozen similar stories with enough presence for us to easily move from individual to chorus. There is a first sequence where all the girls are together, introducing themselves and the reasons that led them to this complex situation; this seems like a simple and naturalistic survey of the director’s protagonists, all of whom are non-professional actresses. undressing in front of a camera that always watches them respectfully.

In series like this or most of the related ones Carla and her friends’ challenges in caring for newborns‘Mother’ becomes a spontaneous and definitive document of how hard it is, to the point where they can disappear for hours on the street not to hear her cries or to confirm that they cannot feed them. facing a situation involving so much responsibility that it is impossible for them to prepare.