A Secret World

Eighteen-year-old Maria (Lucía Uribe) is fed up with school in Mexico City. She has a strained relationship with her mother and harbors no plans for her future. The joyless sex she has with guys is just something to do before they go to the movies. Yet Maria has an introspective side. She even writes encouraging diary entries to herself from an imaginary friend. One day she leaves life behind and takes off hitchhiking across the country. As she goes, she encounters a series of people whose lives she rejects: a lonely single mom; a dirty old man; a sensitive boy named Juan. It’s to Juan that she confides her wonderful recurring dream of a whale waiting in the ocean for her to climb aboard so it can take her to a place of warmth and light. As Maria travels across Mexico, from the city to the desert and onward toward the sea, we see her uncertain future assuming a wider horizon. A SECRET WORLD is a lyrical journey toward Maria’s self-awareness and ours. (In Spanish with subtitles) – B.B.