La Madre – TUBI Review (1/5)

LA MADRE (2024) on TUBI is a thriller “inspired by true events”. It’s also incredibly offensive. Yes, even for a TV movie. A real shame as it deals with a serious subject. Read our full La Madre movie review here!

LA MADRE (2024) is a new TUBI thriller in the true crime genre. Or really, it’s labeled as “inspired by true events”. Then again, so was Tell No Lies and this was grossly misrepresenting the real story.

This time, the story is about human trafficking with a mother doing whatever she can to get her daughter back home. Unfortunately, the amount of offensive details (to Mexicans and Mexican immigrants living in the US) are downright grotesque.

Continue reading our La Madre review below. Find it on TUBI on January 25, 2024.

This movie is bad. Really bad!

In La Madre, is about a young girl, Eva, who is kidnapped by a Mexican cartel. She lives in the US with her mom and sister, but has gone over the border to party with a “friend”.

While the kidnapping is about a ransom, it’s also about human trafficking, so we’re dealing with very serious subjects. Unfortunately, this subject isn’t really at the core of the movie. Instead, it’s the drama between family members and “mom” being tough.

We’ve seen this story many times before. However, this time it’s a woman, You know, like in The Mother or many of the other movies. Still, La Madre goes more of the 1980s or 1990s route; Tiny story and a lot of posturing!

Also, strangely, the mom quickly becomes part of the police investigation to the point that she’s wearing a police vest and running into buildings first. Of course, she can also find out things that the police have struggled with for years.

Not only is this movie offensive to Mexico and Mexicans (as well as descendants of Mexicans going back generations) in so many ways, but it’s also just really bad storytelling.

The power of language

In La Madre, virtually everyone speaks English with a Spanish accent. It does not matter if we’re actually in Mexico or the US. The issue for me is that they should be speaking Spanish with one another.

Why wouldn’t they?!  The situation is dire and everyone is upset, but virtually no Spanish is spoken between them. Instead, very thick accents are used to ensure that we know they all come from Mexico. Either born or generations back.

A PRODUCTION THAT GOT THIS RIGHT

In the new Netflix series Griselda, Spanish is spoken throughout >

An example of when Spanish is spoken is when a US officer (with a Spanish-sounding name, of course) says “El Chacal”. But don’t worry, despite speaking with a woman who also has a solid Spanish accent, he translates it for her: “The Jackel”.

Okay, and a kid has no name but is simply called “El Nino”. It’s like DuoLingo for beginners but with accents instead of actual languages.

It is so grotesquely offensive on so many levels. Including how all Mexicans (or descendants of Mexicans) are either criminals, extremely naive or have been part of a gang in their youth.

Watch La Madre on TUBI now!

La Madre was written and directed by Mitchell Altieri, who immigrated from Brazil. And I have to say that I wasn’t surprised as I couldn’t imagine someone originating from Mexico would make a movie this offensive to Mexicans.

Writer/Director Mitchell Altieri is also better known as part of “The Butcher Brothers” with Phil Flores. They have made quite a few horror movies with IMDb ratings around 4, but also a few with ratings on the good side of 5.

Obviously, this is a TV movie (produced by MarVista) now on TUBI, so you shouldn’t expect too much. Having said that, I have watched many movies that are much better on TUBI and from MarVista, so it’s hardly an excuse.

La Madre is on TUBI from January 25, 2024. 

Details

Director: Mitchell Altieri
Writer: Mitchell Altieri
Stars: Tamara Mazarrasa, Alejandra Corman, Javier Dulzaides, Giovanna Reynaud, Lucía Tinajero, Samantha Orozco