Milk of Sorrow by Claudua Llosa: A Film Analysis

Milk of Sorrow

Claudua Llosa’s film Milk of Sorrow, takes place in Lima, Peru after the period of extreme violence that occurred between 1980 and 1992. Because of the uprising of the Maoist group Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path), paramilitary, and state armed forces, the city of Lima was a threatening space. The main character, Fausta, suffers from the fictional disease called “Milk of Sorrow”, which is transmitted through the breast milk of a mother who was abused or raped in the times of terrorism in Peru.

Fausta lives in constant fear and paranoia because of her disease and after the sudden death of her mother, she is forced to be in unfamiliar circumstances. In these settings, Fausta nervously sings songs to herself. The composer, Selma Mutal, creates a single emotive theme as an expression of interiority for the protagonist, focusing on the transformation of the character development, coupling with camera shots, diegetic sound, and asynchronous sound.

The film opens with Fausta’s mother singing at 00:00:56, the melody only containing 5 notes and many repetitions of the same note.

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She sings of her experience in Lima, Peru in the time of the uprising, where she was brutally raped. The song serves as a dramatic vehicle to have the audience endure heart breaking oral history. It gives back story in a way that doesn’t break the plot like a classic musical.

The introduction of the guitar theme, the only times song is non-diegetic, comes at 00:10:50, when Fausta is walking down the hallways of the hospital after overhearing that she will have to undergo surgery and prescribed a more practical contraceptive.

The melody starts with the repetition of a single note. The ambient sound plays, the camera tracking Fausta at a medium shot, displaying her worry as she continues down the hallway. The sounds around become asynchronous, putting an importance on the protagonist, making the guitar connected to Fausta’s development of emotions for the first time in the film. A slow, 5 note melody starts at 00:11:06, when her eyes start tearing up, the part two to Fausta’s theme.

At 00:15:54, Fausta starts singing her herself in a repetitive, diatonic tune. The close up shot of her face as she nervously sings a story about washing the sadness out of her mother’s clothing references another important emotional moment for Fausta. A long pause occurs until 00:17:03, when the guitar theme picks up again. The silences in shots where Fausta is in focus are used to emphasize the mundane and the tension that Fausta experiences. The viewer is constantly aware of Fausta’s emotional state despite the lack of dialog.

Fausta fiddles with the prescription in her hand, folds it into a crane, then drops it in a tub of water to destroy it. The camera follows the crane until 00:17:03, the moment when Fausta’s theme starts, cutting back to a close-up shot of Fausta’s face. A single note on the guitar plays with long pauses to dramatize the action of the destruction of the prescription for the contraceptive. The guitar theme is used as a transition into the next scene where Fausta and her cousin are looking at various coffin’s for her mother’s body. The setting changes, but the theme carries as well as the image of Fausta’s face, in an extreme close-up shot, in a moment of internal trauma.

Because of the Milk of Sorrow, Fausta has the same perpetual fear that her mother endured. Fausta fears walking through the city alone and in the film we have never seen her travel anywhere, not even to “the big house” where she works, without a family member. The first time she walks to “the big house” is with her aunt starting at 00:22:26. The camera tracks Fausta’s body in a medium shot, with the sound of the market either not in view or out-of-focus. Fausta knows she will be working for the day without a family member nearby for her relief. When she’s left at the door, the guitar theme starts again, indicating a new and stressful moment for the protagonist. She’s having to shift her priorities so that she can make money to properly bury her mother. At 00:54:37, Fausta’s theme plays again for a more dramatic development. Maxima, her cousin, isn’t able to pick her up from “the big house”, so she send a friend to walk Fausta home. Fausta is uncomfortable walking with an unfamiliar man, so she declines and leaves him at the door, not saying much to him and no looking at him. There is just silence in the wide shot of Fausta sitting in the kitchen, displaying her internal tension. The gardener of “the big house” walks Fausta home, the camera tracking Fausta’s face as she walks with him in silence, the repetitive note of the guitar’s theme playing along. This is a turning point in the character development of Fausta. She’s accepted another body within her realm that is outside of her family.

Aida, Fausta’s boss, has forced her way to Fausta’s realm of comfort. She wants to hear the songs Fausta is constantly singing to herself, so Aida offers a pearl for every time Fausta sings a song out loud. The first time the mermaid song is at 00:56:04, when Fausta is comforting herself. This song is established as part of the plot of the film. Aida asks Fausta to sing the mermaid song again at 1:02:14, where the camera focus is in contrast with the rest of the film. While Fausta is singing the mermaid song, the viewer is watching Aida’s reaction to the song in a close-up shot. This is the first time the camera is concerned with the emotions of any character in the film besides Fausta’s. The mermaid song carries into the next shot where we see the pearls in two bowl and then interrupted by the guitar theme when a hand moves a pearl from one bowl to the next at 1:03:53. The payment for the song is dramatized with Fausta’s theme even though her body is not in the shot.

The mermaid song occurs for the last time at the climax of the film at 01:14:23, when Fausta is waiting in Aida’s dressing room, but then hears the piano play her song. There is the initial illusion of non-diegetic music until Fausta stands up in reaction to recognizing the song. She remains silent and apprehensive through the scene of her walking through the hallway, camera tracking her in a wide shot. The piano remains asynchronous to accentuate the protagonist’s internal dialog through facial expressions while she remains completely silent. Fausta leaves with the pearls gripped in her hand and goes to her mother’s body.

Carrying her mother through the beach, Fausta’s theme plays again in a different melody. The tune now has added embellishments and the repetition of a single note is gone. This is the true turning point of Fausta’s character development. Her mother is having her proper burial and she no longer has to go to “the big house” to raise money. Her goal is met.