Femicide. One Case, Many Struggles: A Review

Femicide. One Case, Many Struggles is a documentary by Mara Avila. She made the film for many reasons. But perhaps the most important was as a commemoration of her mother. Mara Avila’s mother, Maria Elena Gomez, was murdered in Buenos Aires in 2005 by a man she was dating. The facts of the case are, very sadly, not unique. Maria started dating a man, but soon discovered that he was prone to fits of jealous rage. Mara didn’t like the way this man spoke to his mother, but what could she do? She later discovered that the man hit Maria. Once, after going on a jealous tirade, Maria told him that if he behaved this way again, she did not want to see him anymore. He turned up later, weeping and claiming that she was the only thing in his life worth living for. Later, he attacked her in a parking lot and stabbed her to death. He then tried to kill himself, but failed.

At the trial, the murder was called a ‘crime of passion,’ and, in a perplexing turn, the man was sentenced to only eight years of prison. The reason for the light sentence seems to have been that the judicial system regarded the fact that the man had had a ‘fit of rage’ as a mitigating circumstance. The fact that he tried to kill himself is seen, in some twisted way, as evidence of the mental anguish the killer must have been suffering.

The film not only documents the long process of grief that Mara has gone through, but is also an attempt to raise awareness of the phenomenon of femicide. Femicide differs from murder because in that it is specifically the murder of a woman because she is a woman. It is properly classified as a hate crime and should be considered an aggravating circumstance rather than a mitigating one. Although it should seem like common sense, the fact that a woman was killed in a fit of jealous rage should make his punishment more severe, not lighter.

Over the course of the film, Mara meets with other women and organizations to discuss the problem of femicide and we learn that there are many many cases where women are attacked and killed and the justice system seems not to be interested in doing anything about it. In Argentina, there are laws about femicide on the books, but they seem rarely to be used in practice. Through demonstrations such as the ‘No One More’ movement, and films such as this, we can only hope that the widespread violence against women by men will stop, or at least be punished appropriately.

The other dimension of this film is the journey that Mara has taken since her mother’s death. Her father doesn’t seem to have been in the picture very much for Mara and she was left more or less to her own devices to figure out what to do about her mother’s estate and her own living arrangements. It did not even occur to her until years later that she should mourn her mother’s passing. Growing up, Mara found that she had a hard time expressing herself to others. Everyone expected her to be happy and to get along and no one wanted to hear about the fact that her mother had been killed. Even family members were reticent about discussing Maria, and Mara was still discovering new details about the murder from her family years later as she made this film.

Eventually, Mara found friends who were interested in fighting against femicide. And she found an outlet for her grief and trauma through various kinds of art, this documentary being an important aspect of that. Today in the west, the concept of art therapy is growing in recognition and popularity. But Mara found this route on her own. Through beautifully shot scenes (and the whole documentary is very beautifully filmed), we see Mara’s dance performances, both by herself with with others, as well as her painting. But, as Mara says, trauma resides in the body and so for her, dance is something she cannot do without. She also used her academic training to write a thesis analyzing the extensive media coverage of her mother’s case.

On the whole, this is a poignant memorial to Maria, as well as a glimpse into the difficult path to healing for those whose loved ones suffer such horrific crimes. And it is, sadly, a much needed reminder about the ongoing crisis of violence against women across the globe.