Neither her advancing age nor her advancing eye cataract, stops doting-disciplinarian and schoolteacher Miss Georgina (Adriana Barraza) from mentoring dropouts in rural Mexico. They’re teens and preteens, shunted from town to town by their parents, slogging in the unsettled railroad-repair industry.
Georgina’s school is an abandoned railroad car, lying where the tracks end. Yet her students learn about discipline and growing up; this is a little more than the three Rs that are the staple of better-endowed schools.
Newbie Ikal (Kaarlo Isaacs) bonds with a bunch of school regulars: Chico (Diego Montessoro), Valeria (Frida Cruz), and Tuerto (Ikal Paredes). His parents send little Ikal to school, confident he’s harnessing his imagination and cultivating belief in himself.
Is that now under threat? Mexico’s politicians plan to replace several small, informal schools like these with fewer, more centralized ones. This consolidation is all done under the guise of reform, of course.
Never mind that teachers like Georgina know their neighborhood needs more, not fewer, schools. Worse, school inspector Hugo Valenzuela (Memo Villegas) is entrusted with shuttering these schools, and it seems like he’s heading Georgina’s way.
Respect
Ikal is thrilled to be building self-respect while learning to respect others. After all, one form of respect flows from, and to, the other. Punctuality, for instance, isn’t an option.Children are usually drawn to what’s fun or pleasing, and away from what’s painstaking or boring. So, Georgina teaches students that they may have the luxury of choosing more of the former while they are still children.
But she also teaches that they will have fewer such choices as adulthood approaches. So, while they’re allowed to have fun where possible, she’s not about to let them off the hook on homework.
What makes a good schoolteacher? Georgina figures it’s the ability to help children read and respond to reality, but truthfully. That means honing their instincts to tell freedom from mere choice, and sincerity from deception. There is also the instinct to tell love from pretense and wisdom from mere knowledge.
The filmmakers ignore the backstories of Ikal’s peers. But in centering Ikal and his parents, they’re hinting that these lessons at school, no matter how powerfully delivered, are wasted, if not backed by exemplary parenting at home.
Ikal’s perpetually ill and fatigued mom, Lucero (Teté Espinoza), rises early to ensure Ikal’s awake in time for school and prepares his food and clothes. She then kisses him goodbye with a “Be good and do your best.”
Ikal’s industrious dad, Tomás (Jero Medina), works on the railroad regardless of work conditions. Sometimes it’s under a blazing sun; at other times it’s under pouring rain. In a touching father-son chat, he explains that, although it doesn’t feel like it, all that work is to ensure a safe and secure future for Ikal.
Chico
The oldest of Georgina’s students, Chico, lacks that context at home. Naturally, his lack of self-respect leads him to try to win it at any cost. He steals from a nearby ranch, pretends to have earned those proceeds from honest work, and cheats to get ahead even in playful contests. Sample his childish bet with Ikal to see who can swim quicker across a stretch of river flowing through their village.
Unsurprisingly, Ikal is unmoved by Chico’s so-called accomplishments; he knows they’re neither honest nor hard-won. Chico’s fun to have around, but Ikal trusts his mom’s instincts.
Lucero takes one look at Chico, from a distance, and quietly tells Ikal, “Be careful with him.” When Ikal innocently questions that, she simply replies, “Mother’s intuition.” What does she mean? The company you keep will invariably shape you and what happens to you.
When the time comes where he’s forced to either receive or reject Chico’s largesse and his enticements around living it up, little Ikal already knows what he’ll do.
