93 mins.
Dir: Mariana Rondón
Venezuela 2013
Cert 15
Starring: Samuel Lange, Samantha Castillo
Living with his mother in a run down housing estate in Caracas, 9 year old Junior is already beginning to feel that he does not conform to the gender norms constantly promoted in his country (machismo for boys and beauty pageant prettiness for girls!) Social conditioning, however, definitely begins at home, as his fraught mother constantly berates her son over his “unmasculinity”, in particular his desire to have his Afro hair straightened in time for the school photograph. She even goes as far as to take Junior to a doctor in her effort to “cure” his supposedly effeminate ways. A touching and droll coming of age story in which our plucky protagonist may have to bend a little, but is not broken!
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