Another winner from John Sayles

I always watch for films directed by John Sayles. His film, Casa de los Babys takes a fictional look at the adoption process in Mexico. Six women–5 Americans and one Irishwoman–are holed up at a hotel in Mexico awaiting approval of their respective applications before taking their newly adopted babies back to America. The soon-to-be mothers (including Lili Taylor, Mary Steenburgen, Daryl Hannah, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Mary Kay Place) have all sorts of personal problems, and for some of these women adopting in America would be problematic. A sense of competition exists between the women as they wait for their babies–who will be the best mother? Who doesn’t ‘deserve’ to be a mother? Each woman has her own unique theories about child rearing, and, of course, the fact that these theories are untested does not make the women deviate one bit.

Senora Munoz (wonderfully acted by Rita Moreno) runs the hotel that houses the waiting women. It’s just a business to her–one she’d rather not examine too closely. The orphanage provides her with a living and also puts food on the table for the employees who lead marginal lives. The film raises some very interesting questions about adoption–some of these questions are tackled directly on the film. Senora Munoz’s useless would-be-revolutionary son wonders how Americans would feel if Mexicans adopted American children and then subsequently raised them in Mexico. He believes this would be considered an outrage and that even if it were allowed to happen, it would be strictly regulated. The alternatives for the children who are not adopted are hopeless–throughout the film a band of street beggars–just children–roam around looking for opportunities to get enough to eat. There are holes in the adoption process for the Mexican children, and that is blatantly obvious as it is revealed that the severely unpleasant Nan’s (Mary Kay Place) stories simply do not add up. But no one cares enough to block her application.

I was a little concerned that this would be a 6 women get-together-touchy-feely-exchange thing. Faith in the director John Sayles told me this film would deliver more than just some lukewarm chat sessions. I was not disappointed. Only one scene was over-the-top with sentimentality–one character waxed on for an interminable amount of time about her soon-to-be daughter. The scene was excessive. The rest of the film, however, offers tremendous food-for-thought.

Ultimately the film is about hope–hope the mothers have for their new children, hope that drives people to purchase a lottery ticket with the only money they have, and hope that keeps people going day after day with the idea that life will improve. Comments from John Sayles are included in the very worthy DVD extras.