Spanish with English subtitles
With Lola Amores, Jean Marcos Fraga Piedra, Isora Morales, Grisel Monzón, Yaité Ruiz, Leandro Sen, Afrodreak, Arnaldo Galbán, Yailín Coppola, Leidys Chiv, Andros Perugorría
Wild Woman, directed by Alán González, tells the gripping story of Yolanda, a forty-year-old woman living in a Havana slum, whose life unravels after a violent confrontation leaves her husband nearly killing her lover. When a video of the incident goes viral, Yolanda becomes the target of scandal and judgment. Desperate to protect her young son from the fallout, she sets out to reclaim him—only to discover that her mother has already taken the boy and fled without her consent.
Over the course of a single harrowing day, Yolanda navigates the labyrinth of Havana in search of her child. Along the way, she must confront her mother’s defiance, her son’s fears, the condemnation of her community, and her own unresolved guilt.
Raw and uncompromising, Wild Woman is a powerful portrait of survival, shame, and resilience, offering a sharp lens on gender, family, and social marginalization in contemporary Cuba.
Press
“With his feature debut, director Alán González provides us with an unflinching look at the frayed social fabric that creates a dangerous distrust among neighbours of the barrio, and gives way to feedback loops of violence.” – Diana Cadavid, Toronto International Film Festival
“The visceral chronicle of a mother's confrontation with herself.” – Ángel Pérez, Rialta
“A portrait of violence in a patriarchal society.” – Infobae
Notes on Film
“Wild Woman has its roots deep in a Havana slum, in a country drowned in poverty and shortages of all kinds. Immersed in a never-ending systemic crisis, we, the people — victims of our own circumstances — quarrel among ourselves all the time, to at least let off steam. Unfortunately, episodes of public shaming, gender violence, and raging intolerance have become increasingly frequent.
Yolanda is a mother who wants to flee with her son to spare him from the public shaming of a crime for which she is blamed. The incident is the talk of the town due to a video that went viral.
In an emotional payback, she confronts everyone with the same ferocious hostility that she was confronted with. Deep inside, however, she is also struggling with her own feelings of guilt — a guilt rooted in gender biases implanted in her by society. But in the end, what counts is that she and her son do want to be together, no matter what happened or what’s on the video. Whether she’s the kind of mother that others expect her to be or not, no one has the right to tear them apart.
Beyond the specific circumstances of Cuba, nowadays we all live in a world that cares more about blaming others rather than understanding them. Where the quest for justice is equated to the need to inflict punishment. Sadly, it seems that people feel that their fears and misfortunes can be somehow mitigated if others also feel (or they themselves cause) a similar pain or suffering.
In any case, Wild Woman is definitely more a story about love than about violence.”
– Alán González, Director
