La Camarista

With an introduction by Rachel Pronger

Eve (Gabriela Cartol) is a conscientious chambermaid who works long hours at a luxurious Mexico City hotel. A single mother, Eve is determined to provide a better future for her son by working her way up the company’s rigid internal hierarchy and landing a prestigious position cleaning the presidential suite on the 42nd floor. Eager to get ahead, Eve enrolls in the hotel’s adult education program, but it soon becomes clear that it takes more than hard work to succeed in a rigged system. The debut feature from Lila Avilés (Totem), is a nuanced human drama with a streak of dry, absurdist humour. Amidst crisp white sheets and plump pillows, Eve invisibly serves the whims of her super-wealthy guests, struggles to navigate cut-throat workplace dynamics and, occasionally, dares to dream of something better. Lila Avilés illustrates with dry wit, the impossibility of navigating the Snakes and Ladders world of work, especially for women, people of colour and those from other marginalised backgrounds, who so often discover that offers of gainful employment come littered with hidden steps, tripwires and trapdoors. A deeply satisfying capitalist satire with a beating human heart. (RP)

Rachel Pronger is a curator, writer and editor based in Berlin. She is a founder of archive activist feminist film collective Invisible Women. She is also co-editor of Cinema of Commoning (cinemaofcommoning.com), an editorial platform celebrating global alternative cinema practice.