Miss Carbón [+leggi anche:
intervista: Agustina Macri
scheda film], the second feature film by Argentine filmmaker Agustina Macri (Soledad), premieres on 12 June in Spain and is distributed by Caramel Films. In one scene, the protagonist gazes, entranced, at the television as she watches Camila (1984), by fellow Argentine director María Luisa Bemberg, in which an aristocrat (played by Susú Pecoraro) defies rigid social conventions when she falls in love with a priest (played by Spanish heartthrob Imanol Arias). It is a mirror moment, as the rest of the film will reveal.

Inspired by true events, Miss Carbón is a fable about pursuing your dreams with such unwavering determination that it transcends gender and the weight of history—or superstition. Carlita (a real person, portrayed in this fiction by Chilean-American actress Lux Pascal) succeeded in becoming the first female miner in a town where women were forbidden from entering the mines (except on Saint Barbara's Day, the patron saint of this arduous trade). In this Patagonian region where the main source of income is coal mining, there is a superstition held that women could cause collapses. But Carlita, a trans woman, managed to break the system from within, sparking a revolution. Today, several women work in the mines of Río Turbio, the town where this heroine (and one of the film's screenwriters) was born and where much of this spectacular film was shot.

“I dreamed of being a miner before I dreamed of being a woman,” the central character confesses to Macri's camera. Facing discrimination from within her own family, she finds support from a group of trans men and women and cross-dressers at a nearby club. There—in a setting that resonates with The Mysterious Gaze of the Flamingo [+leggi anche:
recensione
intervista: Diego Céspedes
scheda film] by Chilean director Diego Céspedes, which recently triumphed at Cannes in the Un Certain Regard section—Carlita discovers not only her chosen home, but also the emotional and moral strength she needs to become everything she dreams of—and everything she feels she is. However, as the script by Erika Halvorsen and Mara Pescio makes clear, this will not be easy. Systemic discrimination will not only come from her co-workers, but also from the women in the mining company, who refuse to accept a transgender colleague among their ranks.

With a cast that blends non-professional actors, including local miners and transgender women, with professionals such as Spanish director Paco León, the film builds in emotional intensity as the story unfolds, and its protagonist begins to realise her goals. That's where the film's empathy resonates, because deep down, we're all a little bit like Carlita. At some point, we all find ourselves pushing back against what society expects of us and we have to “transition” in some way in order to embrace the passions we feel deep inside.

Miss Carbón is a Spanish-Argentinian co-production by Morena Films and The Warning of Rivard AIE in association with Pensa & Rocca Cine. It will be exported by the Italian company Fandango Sales.