August 2008 • Issue 414



My life inside

by Lucía Gajá

My life inside
Product information
(120 minutes)
Star rating
*****
Product link
http://www.imcine.gob.mx/

Sometimes a documentary can leave you frozen with anger in a way a fictional film never can. So it is with this Mexican film, which tells the story of 21-year-old Rosa Jimenez – a Mexican ‘illegal’ – who gets a job as a childminder in the supposedly liberal city of Austin, Texas. One of Rosa’s charges, a little boy, chokes to death on a piece of paper he has swallowed. Rosa is charged with murder. The trial is marred by emotional manipulation of the jurists and the prosecutor’s not-so-subtle racism. Any intelligent weighing of the actual evidence could only lead to one verdict, but this is Texas and Rosa Jimenez gets 99 years. A masterful piece of film-making that leaves the audience gasping at the injustice involved.

RS




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