Leona, a feature film debut by Mexican
director Isaac Cherem, opens in dreamy, sensual slow motion. Seen through a
billowing, diaphanous curtain, a young woman removes her robe and lowers
herself into an elegantly tiled pool surrounded by potted flowers and decorative
trees. As the camera glides through the curtain into this opulent pool setting,
a throng of beautifully dressed women—daughters and mothers—stand by the pool
with joyful faces. A voice recites ritual words to their friend in the water: “Rebeca,
now that heavenly water bathes your body . . . your soul is clean to unite with
the soul of the man you chose as your partner.”
Out of this cluster of women, steps Ariela (Naian
González Norvind), the film’s 25-year-old protagonist, who looks different from the other
women with her light, rippled hair, watchful face, and simpler gown. She dips a
silver pitcher into the water and pours it over Rebeca. When the celebration
ends, Rebeca says to her: “May you find someone soon,
Ariela.”
Finding that life-partner
within the tightly knit framework of Ariela’s Jewish “community,” as her elders
call it, in Mexico City, becomes the film’s driving theme. It entails Ariela’s
coming of age and figuring out who she truly is within the narrow scope of her upper-class
family and religious-cultural heritage. A subtle soundtrack complements every
emotional nuance in this story.
As soon as Ariela
leaves the bridal party and gets into her car, she pulls off her wealthy
woman’s gown and pulls on jeans and a T-shirt. She drives to her current job as
a mural painter and sets up her equipment. Later, while still on this job, she
meets Ivan (Christian Vásquez), a young Mexican man who stops to watch her work.
One thing leads to another, and they fall in love, even though Ariela knows
dating a non-Jew is forbidden in her community.
Time passes and Ariela
meets Ivan’s artistic, educated, and well-off family, but she’s not able to reciprocate
by introducing him to her side—in fact, the family has discovered her secret
and told her he’s not welcome, nor is she if she continues to date him. The
rabbi kindly explains that she’s breaking community rules.
Ariela goes her
own way, moving out of her mother’s apartment and into her own place, though
she continues to share Friday night Shabbat and other traditional events with
the extended family, all of whom love and support her dearly but refuse to
accept her love life. The clan is fiercely loyal, a trait that keeps them separate
and insulated from the greater society they inhabit.
Months pass in
this way, and Ivan’s love erodes because of his rejection by Ariela’s family. He
can’t accept her living two lives, one with him and one that excludes him in a
major way. They break up.
In the montage
that follows, Ariela dates men recommended by the family or the matchmaker, but
none of them are possibilities for her way of living and thinking. On each
date, she’s forced to wonder who she is and what future can she make for
herself? Her best friends, her family, and the men she dates all speak and act
differently from her. Her daily mural work is the one thing that keeps her from
feeling lost. And the artwork is fantastic, creative, therapeutic. She now
signs the intricate images as Leona, because Ariela mean lioness in Hebrew.
At this juncture, Ariela
connects again with Ivan. They meet and talk. He tells her he has a new
girlfriend. They make love, and he invites her to his BBQ later that week. She
goes, meets his new girlfriend, and finds the situation so awkward that she
leaves, as if stumbling blinding inside her mind. She faces the truth that her
choice about her “significant life relationship” can’t be happily solved. How
can she possibly say goodbye to her family of cherished loved ones, even if
they’re so different from herself? And how can she face life within that clan as
an outsider, even with the satisfaction of her creative work? Can she really exist
alone for life? The movie ends without a clear answer, but Ariela’s courage throughout
the movie to be true to herself and identify with her Hebrew name Leona, gives hope
that her future within her difficult circumstances, will find stability.
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