The Second Mother

Description

Val has been a devoted live-in housemaid for a wealthy family in São Paulo for 13 years. From serving impeccable hors d’oeuvres at dinner parties, to keeping track of the father’s medicine regimen, to covering up for the teenage son (with whom she shares a deep emotional bond) when he gets in trouble, Val is a strong maternal figure in the household. One day, her daughter Jessica arrives from their hometown to take university entrance exams and has to stay with Val temporarily in the maid’s quarters. Ambitious, intelligent and with a rebellious streak, Jessica blatantly disregards previously unspoken, yet inviolable rules of the house—she frequents the family’s living and dining spaces and helps herself to the expensive ice cream. To Val’s despair, Jessica acts like a houseguest rather than the hired help’s kin. Slowly, strain in the household starts to rise as the matriarch’s initial polite acceptance of Jessica’s presence morphs into thinly veiled intolerance. A keenly observed, subtly tense, comedy of manners (built around a warm and humorous performance by Brazilian actress and TV host Regina Casé), The Second Mother also paints a timely portrait of a historically nebulous boss-housemaid dynamic deeply rooted in Brazilian society, and the effects of seismic social and economic shifts that have allowed a new generation to break away from a seemingly inescapable mentality of lifetime servitude. —Julia Barbosa

Film Details