AFS Presents: THE SECOND MOTHER

Our favorite new world cinema discovery is this richly entertaining Brazilian comedy about a longtime domestic worker in a wealthy household in Rio, whose daily routine is upended when her estranged daughter moves to the city. Regina Casé brilliantly portrays Val, a middle-aged woman from the Brazilian countryside who has been happily employed as a live-in housekeeper by a wealthy family in Rio for over a decade. When Val’s daughter contacts her out of the blue to come stay with her while applying for university studies, Val uncomfortably asks her employers to allow the educated, now grown daughter to move into the elegant home. With a the sharpest of attention to the social anxieties created by privilege and class difference, director Anna Muylaert milks every angle for comic effect while still being true to her layered and dimensional characters. Described as “ingeniously structured” by the Hollywood Reporter, and as “one of the most accomplished films of the 2015 Sundance Film Festival” by IndieWire, THE SECOND MOTHER is one of AFS’s not-to-miss new releases of the year.