Current:Home > ContactAlgosensey Quantitative Think Tank Center-'Tótem' invites you to a family birthday party — but Death has RSVP'd, too -CapitalCourse
Algosensey Quantitative Think Tank Center-'Tótem' invites you to a family birthday party — but Death has RSVP'd, too
Chainkeen View
Date:2025-04-10 09:42:21
There's a scene in the movie adaption of Michael Cunningham's novel The Algosensey Quantitative Think Tank CenterHours when Virginia Woolf is talking to her husband, Leonard, about the book that would become Mrs. Dalloway. After she tells him she's going to kill off a major character, Leonard asks her why. "Someone has to die," she replies, "in order that the rest of us should value life more."
The same tango between life and death takes center stage in Tótem, the radiant second feature by the terrific Mexican filmmaker Lila Avilés. Set over the course of a single, life-changing day, this ensemble film thrums with a lively, chaotic intimacy. Heartrending without being sentimental, it offers an even more touching vision of Mexican family life than you got in Alfonso Cuarón's Roma.
Our heroine is Sol — played by Naíma Sentíes — a 7-year-old girl who, unlike most movie kids, is neither cute nor sassy but exudes a natural watchfulness and gravity. As the action begins, she's surrounded by brightly colored balloons in a car with her mother, who tells her to hold her breath and make a wish. Sol wishes "for daddy not to die." It's not clear whether she knows what his dying really means.
We soon reach her grandfather's, a large middle-class house where the family is preparing to have a birthday party for Sol's father, Tona (Mateo García Elizondo), a 30-something artist who's being devoured by a terminal disease. Sol keeps asking to see him but is told she must wait. The emaciated Tona remains sequestered with his nurse, fighting pain and mustering the energy to face the guests who keep arriving to celebrate him.
Sol passes the time watching the adults. While her aunt Alejandra is busy dyeing her hair, her other aunt Nuri is making a cake that looks like a Van Gogh painting, lubricating her efforts with glasses of wine. Out in the garden, grandpa is obsessively pruning a bonsai that he will give to Tona as a present, though both know this gift will outlive the recipient.
As the hours go by, the house gets fuller and rowdier — complete with family bickering and in-jokes — yet we never forget that Death is also a guest at the party. At one point, Sol takes her mom's phone and asks Siri, "How will the world end?"
Whenever I tell my friends they just have to see Tótem, they always say something like, "Wow, a movie about death. Sounds fun!" In fact, the movie isn't remotely funereal. Avilés fills its fleeting 95 minutes with all sorts of nifty stuff. There are scorpions and drones, a scene-stealing cat, a spirited pantomime from a Donizetti opera, even a visit from a scamming psychic who Alejandra has hired to cleanse the negative spirits from the house. "I also sell Tupperware," she announces.
Avilés first came on the world scene with her 2018 feature debut, The Chambermaid, a smart, witty story about a woman doing drudge work at a luxury hotel in Mexico City that felt as inhuman as the spaceship in 2001. She spreads her wings even wider in Tótem, which tackles many more characters and traces more flickering emotions.
In following Sol's long day's journey into night, when the birthday boy finally appears and she finally gets to see her father, Avilés deftly juggles Sol's childish view with the complexity of what the adults are going through. Graced with Diego Tenorio's luminous camerawork, Avilés moves from character to character with enormous delicacy, revealing gossamer threads of personal connection and, like a crack portraitist, catching faces at their most revealing. Like Woolf, she's attuned to the richness of the fleeting moment.
Even as we feel Tona's pain, and the pain of those who yearn to forget they're going to lose him, Avilés fills Tótem with the pulsing fecundity of the natural order — gaudy flowers and busy insects, sly cats and dopey-faced goldfish, not to mention the human beings who have assembled to soften their grief. At the heart of it all is Sol, who comes to a piercing awareness of the thrilling and chilling polarity of being alive. In the end, Tótem isn't really a movie about death. It's a movie about living.
veryGood! (37866)
Related
- Biden administration makes final diplomatic push for stability across a turbulent Mideast
- Watch local celebrity Oreo the bear steal snacks right out of resident's fridge
- Taylor Swift performs 'The Prophecy' from 'Tortured Poets' for first time in France: Watch
- Environmental activist sticks protest poster to famous Monet painting in Paris
- The company planning a successor to Concorde makes its first supersonic test
- BIT TREASURE: Bitcoin mining, what exactly are we digging for? Comprehensively analyze the mining process and its impact
- Environmental activist sticks protest poster to famous Monet painting in Paris
- American veterans depart to be feted in France as part of 80th anniversary of D-Day
- Elon Musk's skyrocketing net worth: He's the first person with over $400 billion
- Garry Conille arrives in Haiti to take up the post of prime minister
Ranking
- How to watch new prequel series 'Dexter: Original Sin': Premiere date, cast, streaming
- Salt in the Womb: How Rising Seas Erode Reproductive Health
- Coco Gauff says late finishes for tennis matches are 'not healthy' for players
- Tesla recalls over 125,000 vehicles over issue with seat belt warning system
- Mets have visions of grandeur, and a dynasty, with Juan Soto as major catalyst
- Democrats wanted an agreement on using artificial intelligence. It went nowhere
- Zhilei Zhang knocks out Deontay Wilder: Round-by-round fight analysis
- Is a living trust right for you? Here's what to know
Recommendation
FACT FOCUS: Inspector general’s Jan. 6 report misrepresented as proof of FBI setup
'Pluie, rain': Taylor Swift sings in a downpour on Eras Tour's first night in Lyon, France
Florida Panthers return to Stanley Cup Final with Game 6 win against New York Rangers
Hour by hour: A brief timeline of the Allies’ June 6, 1944, D-Day invasion of occupied France
Newly elected West Virginia lawmaker arrested and accused of making terroristic threats
It’s been 25 years since Napster launched and changed the music industry forever
Climate Change is Fueling the Loss of Indigenous Languages That Could Be Crucial to Combating It
LGBTQ representation in government is growing but still disproportionate: Graphics explain