Rent The Milk of Sorrow (2009)

The high desert plateau of love - The Milk of Sorrow review by joannajuki

This film had an atmosphere of tremendous calm and gentleness, joy and celebration in the meso-American culture. Part I, however, was over-the-borderline weird, as the plot revolved around Fausta having believed that she could ward off the horror of war-rape, by inserting a potato into her vagina. Part II was much stronger, better plotted and more moving. It becomes clear that after her mother's death Fausta is a victim of familial sexual abuse from her father, and in a mutually caustic relationship with her more cynical sister - (the weird hasn't entirely dissipated).

She has now grown a little older and wiser,and falls in love, only to sacrifice it all for a material possession, a simple, single piece of jewellery. She is irrationally attached to this gem, and loses everything - even her personal honor.

Inherited Pain, Frame by Frame - The Milk of Sorrow review by griggs

The Milk of Sorrow takes its time–and then some. Set in post-conflict Peru, it’s all about inherited trauma, memory, and the stuff we carry whether we want to or not. The metaphors are everywhere–some land straight away, others feel like a puzzle you’re not sure you want to solve. It’s slow, sometimes frustratingly so, but there is also beauty in the way it’s shot and in the small rituals it lingers on. Magaly Solier gives a performance that’s quiet but hard to ignore. It doesn’t build to anything big, but the weight of it still hangs around.

Facing horror with humour - The Milk of Sorrow review by PW

What an unexpected delight. The film begins in darkness in every sense of the word and follows the travails of Fausta, who has both had trauma told to her and possibly experienced it since childhood. But using magic realism and performances from Meso Americans who are not trained actors we are transported to their culture and come away with a real sense of hope.