Maurel’s ‘Forever Your Maternal Animal’ Review
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- Forever Your Maternal Animal is a sophomore film by Costa Rican‑French director Valentina Maurel, whose 2022 debut “I Have Electric Dreams” won a Locarno award and was Costa Rica’s Oscar submission.
- Marina De Tavira plays mother Isabel, an Oscar‑nominee for Alfonso Cuarón’s “Roma”, who is preoccupied with reissuing a poetry book from her twenties.
- Amalia (played by Mariangel Montero) confesses to having sex with spirits, a scene that jolts both her sister Elsa and the audience into a blend of reality and fantasy.
- Elsa (Daniela Marín) is a pragmatic sister on a break from life in Belgium, whose secretive behavior contrasts with Amalia’s confessional style.
- Valentina Maurel structures the film as an episodic hangout, using vignettes like visiting a dementia‑stricken nanny and a dog‑trainer boyfriend’s cooking session to build a portrait of the three women rather than a conventional plot.
Why it matters: Valentina Maurel and the Costa Rican arthouse scene gain international exposure, boosting festival interest, attracting new funding streams, and opening distribution opportunities for Latin American cinema.
