A film that focuses on a community that lives one of the most invisible existences to society: those of women in prison, here in Chile. In a daring move, the images we see were captured clandestinely using mobile phones, a forbidden object. Between poverty and longing, what is transmitted and transcends the walls that surround the women is the love for their distant children and the strength of the bonds that are created in confinement.
Made from materials recorded clandestinely while they were serving their sentences in one of the largest women’s prisons in Chile, Malqueridas explores the experience of motherhood within the prison space.
The film was in the making for more than 7 years, with monumental labour in editing and choosing from thousands of photographs and videos recorded in first person using cell phone cameras.
Recording, they denounce. Recording, they remember. Recording, they save the precious moments when they had their children close by.
The portrait of motherhood behind bars in Malqueridas is also done through a voice of a woman that can be heard throughout the entire film. It is a collective voice, which narrates her own experiences and the experiences reported to the director by other women in the same circumstances.
Tana Gilbert’s first feature film has images and testimonies of inestimable political value, challenging us to reflect on the reality of living in a prison. In this documentary work, we witness intimacy and affection between women. In mutual comfort, they repair the loss and violence that is separation from their loved daughters and sons. And by joining forces, these women resist. (Alexandra Ferraz)
