Critic Rating
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Director
Brillante Mendoza
Cast
Jaclyn Jose,
Julio Diaz,
Felix Roco,
Jomari Angeles,
Andi Eigenmann
Genre
Drama
Ma’ Rosa, a mother of four, owns a small convenient store in a poor neighborhood of Manila. To make ends meet, Rosa and her husband, Nestor, resell small amounts of narcotics on the side. When they are arrested one day, Rosa’s children must buy their parents’ freedom from the corrupt police.
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The Film Stage by Rory O'Connor
We’re asked to empathize with Rosa from the get-go despite barely being able to make out whatever anguish she’s been suffering. Mendoza will rectify this late on in an emotionally earth-shattering final sequence, the type that lingers with you like a faint cry for help.
The Playlist by Nikola Grozdanovic
Purposefully joyless and bereft of any kind of aesthetic gratification other than the one found in Mendoza’s use of cinema verite and non-sentimental approach, Ma’ Rosa is tough-as-nails, and leaves you with a heaviness and a pulsating sympathy that’s impossible to ignore.
Variety by Maggie Lee
As in most of the director’s repertoire, he portrays working class family relations with unpretentious warmth. Boasting a simple, coherent plot shot with real-time, handheld verismo, it’s a work of understated confidence.
TheWrap by Ben Croll
Filipino director Brillante Mendoza’s neorealist indictment of police corruption looks unlike any other film playing in Cannes’ Official Competition. It’s just that what sets the film apart is its visual ugliness.
Screen Daily by Allan Hunter
Ma’ Rosa is atmospheric and involving to a degree but also feels as if we are in familiar territory.
Time Out London by Geoff Andrew
If there’s nothing profoundly original or insightful here, there’s no denying the atmosphere of squalid authenticity, particularly in the scenes shot on the streets.
Screen International by Allan Hunter
Ma’ Rosa is atmospheric and involving to a degree but also feels as if we are in familiar territory.
The Hollywood Reporter by Boyd van Hoeij
Troy Espiritu’s plot-driven screenplay and Mendoza’s preference for a gritty, documentary-like style mean that the final result is neither as deep nor as resonant as it could have been.
The Guardian by Peter Bradshaw
Ma’Rosa is made with control and clarity, a narrative purpose which is held on to despite an apparently aimless docu-style, and a clear sense of jeopardy. My reservation is that it doesn’t reveal much of what is going on in Rosa’s mind and heart.
CineVue by John Bleasdale
The nighttime tungsten orange of the street lighting and the urine-coloured neon of the interiors makes for a grueling visual experience which is why the daylight of the latter-half offers precious relief.
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