The Chambermaid (2018)
Review of The Chambermaid / La camarista (2018), directed by Lila Avilés
I’ve been meaning to get into Mexican cinema for the longest while now. The only Mexican film I’ve watched has been part of Roma when it first came out, but I literally only watched twenty minutes of it (a shame, I know, it’s on my to-watch list again). I was bored on a Thursday morning while scouring Kanopy for something to watch, and so I happened to land on this film. Set in Mexico City, we follow a maid who works at a hotel through her monotonous routines at work. This is a very slow film, one that many would probably get frustrated with and would click off after thirty minutes, but I promise there’s some reward in finishing this film.
With that being said, let’s dive straight into the review, shall we?
Content
The entirety of this film has been shot in the same luxury hotel in Mexico City, where our main character, Eve, works at. She tends to keep her head down as she works, doesn’t seem to have any interests. We also don’t see her interacting with any of her coworkers or get any context about who she or her background is, until it is revealed she has a four year old son at home.
On a daily basis, she tends to watch a baby of a woman from Argentina, who seems to be quite fond of Eve. As she showers openly in front of Eve, she chats with her, treats her like a friend. And Eve seems to like that, like it gives her a purpose to continue onwards. There’s also a window cleaner who always lurks outside of the windows of the rooms that Eve is cleaning in, clearly trying to get something sexually from her. She is also due for a promotion due to her hard work.
Eve also joins a GED class, where she finally begins to break out of her shell a bit because of her outgoing classmates. Her teacher also gives her a copy of a book from his desk, and, for the first time in a long time, Eve begins to read for pleasure. She’s so isolated in her environment, constantly sought after and used by the people around her, and it begins to become claustrophobic, as if the suffocating daily routine is closing in on the viewer as well.
It’s such a quiet film but we see how this environment is getting to the main character through the nuance in the acting. She’s helpless. She can’t really do anything lest she loses the promotion. And so she continues onwards, cleaning rooms and objects she’ll never be able to afford during her lifetime, seeking a single red dress that a customer has left behind. There is no escape for the people who work in hotels, and it’s sad to see cater to the wealthy who have so much more than they do.
Overall Thoughts
It’s an okay movie at the end of the day. It can be seen as a bit boring to the average viewer, but it offers critical insight in a quiet way to the lives of the people working as help in hotels, especially abroad. I hope a privileged American or Westerner would watch this and realize how hard it is to live this life. Eve is depicted as virtually having no life outside of work, only learning to have a bit more fun when she breaks out of her shell at the GED class. This’ll probably be useful for research purposes, but I don’t think personally I will be rewatching it.
