Casa de los babys (House of the Babies) - John Sayles

nell'America centrale c'è un posticino dove le povere del luogo vendono o danno in adozione bambini e bambina a più o meno ricche nordamericane che non vedono l'ora, pagando, di tornare a casa con il bottino.
è un'industria redditizia, per tutti, ma non è tutto così semplice come potrebbe sembrare.
John Sayles dà uno sguardo a questo mondo, dove tutti hanno un nome, una storia e un ruolo, nella macchina fabbrica bambini.
forse non è il miglior film di John Sayles, ma è un film di John Sayles e tanto basta.
buona visione - Ismaele

…Sayles handles this material with gentle delicacy, as if aware that the issues are too fraught to be approached with simple messages. He shows both sides; the maid Asuncion gave up her baby and now imagines her happy life in El Norte, but we feel how much she misses her. The squeegee kids on the corner have been abandoned by their parents and might happily go home with one of these rich Americanas. Sayles sees like a documentarian, showing us the women, listening to their stories, inviting us to share their hopes and fears and speculate about their motives. There are no answers here, just the experiences of waiting for a few weeks in the Casa de los Babys.

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… Sayles’ intellectual sensibility and ability to keep the film from falling into a sandtrap of caricatures and political polemics as he explores the economic landscape make it all worthwhile, though it is still one of his minor films. It never sustained the passion throughout for what he was trying to spit out about the great economic divide and cultural differences between countries, except for a few scenes. The best scene is of the earnest hotel maid Asuncion (Vanessa Martinez) conversing with Eileen, the only one of the group who looked upon the workers as real people with feelings, as Eileen explains why she wants to adopt and the maid counters as to why she had to give up the child she had at 14. This was powerful drama. To add to that, Eileen can't fully translate what the maid told her, but they both understood the universal language of motherhood. Sayles was trying to point out without laying down pat answers, that people from other cultures and classes are not that different, it is mostly the luck of the draw that gives people more of an opportunity to succeed. The Americans regard the baby as a vital commodity in their way of life that they must have to keep up with the American Dream, while the South Americans have too many children (viewed as natural resources) and to support them is more of a hardship than a blessing. 

Even an uneven Sayles film is superior to most such Hollywood dramas. Though the ensemble cast all give strong performances, it is hard to dig deeper into the more internal issues that drive people to think they can be saved by having a baby and not by looking more closely at themselves. Without knowing more about the characters, it is hard to feel much passion for their plight. Nevertheless, this is an honest look at rich yanquis taking advantage of those in a Third World country, as they use their money to get what they want. Not many other filmmakers choose to go down this noncommercial road, and have enough nerve to leave off with an existential ending instead of a shocking payoff. Sayles' little joke might be that the baby the one racist member of the group gets to adopt, is the one with the brownest skin.

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… Le americane farebbero qualsiasi cosa per avere un bambino, gli autoctoni sono divisi fra i problemi economici e le gravidanze indesiderate. Per le strade pittoresche, in cui i turisti si affollano in cerca di souvenir e prodotti locali, si aggirano ragazzini magri, sporchi, analfabeti, che per alleviare le sofferenze di una vita ingiusta sniffano vernice, che si sentono ricchi perché qualcuno gli regala un libro che non sanno neppure leggere. A nessuna delle donne viene in mente di adottarne uno, di salvare una vita da una condizione pietosa. Tutte vogliono un neonato, "nuovo", da istruire ed educare secondo le migliori tradizioni americane.
Il grido di denuncia di uno degli ultimi registi off della cinematografia americana, si staglia netto contro il falso moralismo di tutti quegli americani che imperterriti, convinti della loro buona fede, continuano ad alimentare un deprorevole traffico.
Nel cast troviamo una Daryl Hannah, sempre in splendida forma, alle prese con il personaggio più tormentato della vicenda e la "segretaria" Maggie Gyllenhaal, ricca e dolce sposina ormai decisamente lontana dal personaggio che l'ha resa famosa.
A metà strada fra la commedia e il dramma, il film non convince appieno e termina lasciando lo spettatore piuttosto perplesso e poco convinto che le scene passate sullo schermo siano state davvero soddisfacenti. 

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