Twisting and contradictory bureaucratic channels, endless forms, and a demoralizing lack of support – this is the reality of millions immigrating to the United States of America in hopes of realizing a better future for themselves and their families. We’ve seen it in the news and on our feeds, but rarely is the story told from the perspective of those who have navigated the system. Even more rare is someone who can tell these stories with the gravity and seriousness they deserve while recognizing the bizarre and (often funny) ridiculous nature of the immigrant experience.
Julio Torres’ Problemista follows Alejandro (Julio Torres) through a slightly liminal New York City. It’s New York, but maybe not the same New York City we all know and love – something is off. Alejandro is an aspiring toy designer from El Salvador who came to New York hoping to attend Hasbro’s Talent Incubation Program but ends up having to work as an archivist at a cryogenic center for deceased artists. This is not exactly his dream job, but hey, it’s only temporary. Unfortunately, being an archivist proves to be a little too temporary when he’s fired (or “laid off,” as he puts it) over a mistake at work. With a month to find someone to sponsor his work visa or face deportation, Alejandro agrees to help the wife of his former cryogenic patient curate a show featuring her late husband’s works.
Anyone who has followed Torres through Los Espookys and All My Favorite Shapes will know he has developed an aesthetic and comedic language that is uniquely his. Often mixing child-like themes and colors with cynical commentary and surrealist imagery, Torres’ work places itself in conversation with the long-standing canon of Latin American magical realists and surrealists that have come before him. Torres doesn’t simply draw from these literary traditions but also builds upon them to create something playful, queer, and Latinx that could have only come from a playful, queer, and Latinx artist like Torres. He understands the memetic aesthetic language of generations raised on the Internet and employs it to create a film that speaks to Zillenial audiences without dating itself upon future rewatches.
Torres excels at communicating the urgency and stress of immigration through visual metaphors, using surrealist and fantastical imagery to stress the importance of time and the impossibly contradictory nature of obtaining visa sponsorship in the U.S. His penchant for child-like imagery bleeds into the climactic phone call between Alejandro and Elizabeth (Tilda Swinton), which invokes images of a children’s theater and action figures. Elizabeth is integral to keeping the film’s tension alive with her erratic nature and menacing aura. A lesser performer would’ve pushed the character into caricature, but Swinton, unsurprisingly, knows just when to lean into Elizabeth’s bizarre and capricious tendencies and when to pull her back into a more humanized place.
Films about the struggles of immigration often understandably focus on the immigrant. But immigration is as much about what is left behind as it is about what awaits the immigrant. Problemista is as much about Alejandro and his relationship with his mother as it is about navigating the labyrinthine immigration process. We see Alejandro’s mother worry over her son from her home slash design studio in El Salvador, her anxieties manifesting through WhatsApp voice notes, phone calls, and well-intentioned but ultimately futile money transfers.
Problemista is a film that could only have been made by Julio Torres, whose humor, voice, and aesthetics tap into modern sensibilities while still maintaining an identity that is, at its core, singularly Latinx and queer. A strong feature-film debut from one of the most exciting creative voices out there, Problemista balances darker themes of worker and immigrant exploitation with the comedy and ridiculousness that accompanies the immigrant experience, proving that Julio Torres is someone to keep an eye on.
Rating: 8.5/10
You must be logged in to post a comment.