El Espíritu de mi Mamá
7.4 /10 1 Votes
Director Ali Allie Duration Country Honduras | 7.2/10 IMDb Genres Drama, World cinema Writer Ali Allie Language Spanish | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Release date 1999 Cast Francisca Crisanto (Sonia\'s mother), Johana Martinez (Sonia), Rosibel Reyes , Tomasa Martínez , Jorge Martínez , Marcelina Fernández | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
El Espíritu de mi Mamá ("The Spirit of my Mother") is a Spanish language feature film by Ali Allie about Garifuna woman's journey home to Honduras to embrace her cultural roots. It premiered at SXSW in 1999 and later at Dawn Breakers International Film Festival. It was released on DVD in 2002 by Vanguard Cinema and was the first fictional movie featuring Garifuna actors in leading roles. It features an extended religious ritual segment with traditional Garifuna songs and traditional punta dance.
Contents
Synopsis
A meditative and dramatic tale of a young woman’s remarkable journey to her forgotten homeland. Sonia is a single mother living in Los Angeles, far removed from her Garifuna—West African, Arawak and Carib Indian—roots. Haunted by memories of an American soldier she once loved and dreaming of her dead mother, Sonia searches for answers among the mundane landscape, but finds few. After getting fired from her job as a nanny, Sonia journeys to Honduras to grant her mother’s request to perform a ceremony that will let her rest in peace. As her elders teach her the sacred Garifuna ritual, Sonia begins to embrace her own nearly forgotten and rich cultural roots, as well as her identity as a mother to a daughter of her own. Set amidst the Honduran landscape and punctuated by traditional Garifuna music, Spirit of my Mother is a story about one woman’s transformation as she learns to embrace the past and move gracefully into the present. -- N. Isaacs, Mill Valley Film Festival
Theatrical Screenings
Reviews
"An ethnographic dramatic debut which makes up in sincerity what it obviously lacked in available coin... paints vivid portrait of the culture" -- Variety
