Mariana Iglesias
08/29/2020 - 15:16
- Clarín.com
- Society
Thursday night there was something very similar to a party at Yanina Avila's house. Sitting in front of a borrowed computer , surrounded by children, mother, sisters, brothers-in-law, nephews, she saw “Crimes de familia”, the Argentine film in which she acts. She plays Gladys Pereyra. "What a joy to be alive to see you go so far," her mother told her. "I am very happy, with a lot of pride," she says to Clarín from a phone that was also borrowed because hers broke nine months ago.
Yanina is 29 years old and lives in the town where she was born, May 25, Misiones. Her photos and her name are in the local media. Also international. The film premiered on Netflix on August 20 and is among the top ten most viewed on the platform. The world praises her performance, the face, the body that she put on Gladys. Before, in 2017, she had been Marcela in “A species of family”, another Argentine film. Her performance then earned her the Premio del Sur as a revelation.
In “Family Crimes” Gladys is a domestic worker who arrives by bus from “the interior” to the sixth floor of Posadas 1550, the Recoleta department where Daniel Ignacio Arrieta (Migue Angel Solá) and Alicia Campos (Cecilia Roth live ). She thus becomes a bedside employee in this marriage with a son who gets everyone in trouble . Gladys too. In “Una especia de familia” Marcela was a young woman sunk in poverty with three children that she could not support, pregnant with another that she had to deliver.
Yanina Avila as Gladys Pereyra, the domestic worker of a Recoleta couple in "Crimes de familia". Netflix photo
Yanina is the mother of Kevin, 9, and Santiago, 4. She raises her children without a father , just like her mother, Norma, who raised her four children alone. “I didn't have a dad, I did, but I never lived with him. The one who fought to raise us was my mom. She worked all day, but it wasn't enough, ”says Yanina. He finished elementary school and began sweeping other courtyards, ironing outside, cleaning houses. I was 13 years old.
"I am very proud. I had to help my mom ”. Years ago, Yanina started as a cleaning employee at a community center on May 25 . One day it was filled with cameras, actors, actresses. They were part of the team of "A Species of Family", the film directed by Diego Lerman . "They came to the community center because this is a small town, there are no places like cinemas or theaters ...", says Yanina. A friend approached him: "Come on, cheer up, tell them you like to act."
She was dying of shame. But someone turned on the camera and Yanina spoke. "That's how I started, like a child who is taken off to walk alone ... I'm from the interior, I never studied, but that day I let go and I felt very comfortable."
"I can't do it, I can't touch him, it's very unfair to hold that baby," she says like Marcela in a scene from "A kind of family." She had given birth to the baby she was supposed to deliver and she didn't want to pick it up, look at it, or smell it . In the end she does it, like everything that this couple of porteños who traveled to Misiones to buy the baby that they cannot have otherwise asks of her.
"I have known families who have experienced situations like this," Yanina now says by phone. The word "family" is repeated , in his voice, in his two films. Sebastián Schindel , director of "Family Crimes", recalls that this detail came up the day they met Yanina and that she replied: "Maybe God put me on the road because maybe I have something to say."
“Sitting down to talk with Sebastián was like being with a father that I never had, I never felt the embrace of a father . With Diego it had been the same. I felt very proud to be able to work again with people who have so much love to give, ”says Yanina.
Cecilia Roth, in "Family Crimes", with Yanina's son outside and inside the film. Photo / Netflix Media
In "Family Crimes" there is a father who does not accompany, another who abandons and abuses, another who tires and leaves, another who beats and rapes. "There are many women who go through what Gladys is going through, who have problems with their parents. You never know what happens within the four walls , and the girls and women who experience that do not know how to express themselves, they scratch to ask for help and help ".
Yanina speaks of abuse: "How to give signs? You have to unite with women, unity is strength. You have to value yourself as women, as girls, you have to say no when it is no. There are girls who have a woman's body but are girls . There are women who get carried away by someone who seems affectionate, but no. "
Yanina Avila is taken to testify in a trial in "Family Crimes". Netflix photo
In her last film, standing in front of a court that is trying her for a serious crime, Gladys tells that her mother died when she was very young, and that her father went to the mountains and left her alone for days, until she returned and slept. nap with her . What the son of her "employer" did to her, she will not tell the judges. She will tell her "employer" later.
The film shows a network of women that is woven little by little and that is what finally sustains. "We women have each other, and we support each other. Women do not have to lower our arms, we have the same rights as men," says Yanina.
Santi, the boy in the movie who plays his son, is his son in real life. He says aunt to "the landlady" (Roth), who is the one who takes care of him. At first the guardianship imposed by this lady from Recoleta bothers , but Gladys understands and chooses it.
"Women cannot lower our arms," he repeats. "We have women's shields. And we have to unite because a mountain is made from a grain of sand. And we are going to make men stop hatred and beatings . Transform that violence into love. We want equality. "
Santi, the boy who plays the son in "Family Crimes" is Yanina's son in real life. Netflix photo
To shoot the movie, Yanina lived in Buenos Aires for two months. He came with Santi, which was the first time he was on a plane . For her it was the second time. The fear is still not over it. "But it was a very beautiful experience that does not fade. I miss life there a lot, the filming, feeling that every day my work was better, and the people I met. I spoke with people I never thought I was going to speak."
Contact with Cecilia Roth continued afterward, with some phone chats, until the phone broke, and the quarantine. On Thursday night, when they saw the movie, Santi yelled "Auntie!" every time Cecilia Roth appeared on the screen. Yanina wants to continue acting .
"Working on this second film was like touching the sky with my hands," he says. "I want this dream to continue and I have faith that the doors will continue to open for me. I hope I can work again with people as dear to me as Diego and Sebastián, who they are like my family. "