QUICK AND DIRTY: LIVE FROM SAN SEBASTIAN

Yoseli receives a custodial sentence of four and a half years without the possibility of parole for trying to smuggle two kilos of cocaine into Argentina. Upon arriving in a high-security prison prison, she is asked to undress in front of countless prison guards. She refuses to take her underwear off due to intimacy concerns: she’s having her period. She struggles to mingle with the other inmates. Sounds grim? Well it isn’t. Reas is a film bursting with positivity and hope, and masterfully captured with gorgeous hues, and in vivid detail. Yoseli and others reconstruct their personal stories through acting, singing and dancing.

At first, Yoseli refuses to mingle with the other prisoners, who insist that they join the “family”. They promise that they will nurture and protect her. “I already have a family outside”, she explains. Gradually, she blends in with the adorable motley crew. They include Estefy (a young blonde who dreams of living in a sunny country with her child), Nacho (a transexual man who gets married to his partner Estela in confinement), Noelia (a Madonna-loving transexual woman and former prostitute, with a loud and gregarious personality despite her conspicuously missing front teeth), and a few others. Together they form a band, and sing their worries away, with choreographed dance numbers and the most heartwarming smiles printed to their faces.

Tattoos are also a powerful storytelling device. Yoseli has the Eiffel Tower printed on her shoulders because she dreams of one day visiting the French capital. Noelia inked her mom’s name around her hips in order to forge a connection with her estranged parent, but instead received a beating for it. And so on

Prison has never been this vibrant before. The settings are bright and spacious. The prison wardens are warm and welcoming, perhaps because they too are former inmates. It is remarkable that a punishment can be transformed into rosy memories, and then beautifully transposed into a meaningful movie. That’s perhaps because the experience is infused with femininity. I doubt that an all-male prison film – documentary, fiction, or autofiction – could boast the same joie-de-vivre. It must be noted that objective of the Reas isn’t to normalise and celebrate prison life, but instead to pay tribute to the individual characters, and to gender-inclusive sorority (while I don’t understand the rationale that allowed both a female-to-male and a male-to-female transsexual to share their space with cis women, I certainly applaud the decision).

All of the characters are played by themselves, and the settings – while large and decently illuminated – are still very realistic. In fact, the movie is shot inside the disused Caseros penitentiary. The walls are crumbling, and there are no windows connecting these women to the outside world. An inner courtyard offers them respite and redemption, as well as a location for a very charming and surprising closing sequence. Despite a few contrived interactions and some loose narrative threads, Reas remains an inventive piece of filmmaking, and a real delight to watch. The project was born from a workshop that director Lola Arias conudcted inside Ezeiza Prison (in the outskirts of metropolitan Buenos Aires) during the pandemic.

Reas just premiered in the 72nd edition of the 72nd San Sebastian International Film Festival.