Alice’s House

Alice’s House

2007. Brazil. Written and directed by Chico Teixeira. With Carla Ribas. In a working-class district of São Paulo, Alice, a fortyish manicurist, lives in a cramped apartment with her unfeeling taxi-driver husband of more than 20 years, two of her three adult sons, and her elderly mother. Tempted to have an affair with the husband of one of her clients, and suspicious of her own husband’s fidelity, she lets her tumultuous thoughts provide grist for dreamy fantasies. Carla Ribas’s effortless, earthy performance anchors this compassionate look at ordinary people’s extraordinary buoyancy in the face of daily disappointments. In Portuguese; English subtitles. 94 min.