Representations of sadness in indigenous Mexican cinema: La tiricia or how to cure sadness, by Ángeles Cruz

Abstract

Introduction: The objective is to analyze Ángeles Cruz's representation of sadness as a spiritual illness derived from the sexual violence that is represented in her short film La tiricia o cómo curar la tristeza. Methodology: Qualitative because it recovers the proposal of Bordwell, who proposes two categories for cinematographic analysis: plot and style, which cover formal and narrative aspects, adding Abric's category of social representations for symbolic analysis. Results and Discussion: Indigenous cinema in Mexico has been consolidated as a form of resistance to the narratives imposed by Western cinema, such is the case of Cruz's cinema, which approaches the issue of women and child sexual violence based on a process of representing sadness and its healing from the indigenous vision. Conclusions: Cruz's speech is developed based on real situations or beliefs that are still reiterated in her community about the violence, abandonment, and poverty that women experience. In addition to the above, it shows elements of everyday life and social representations of sadness and healing from a magical-natural thought linked to ethnoterritoriality.