LOS ANGELES: “Beatriz at Dinner” — a film that takes a hard look at class, racism and environmental destructions — is seemingly perfectly suited for the Trump era, even though it was filmed before the Republican billionaire took office.
The film stars Salma Hayek as a Mexican immigrant living in the US who was separated from her family after a failed real estate project decimated her small town.
The woman, who describes herself as “ugly, old and fat,” now makes her living as a massage therapist among the wealthy in posh Orange County, in southern California.
Hayek plays Beatriz in plain clothes, no makeup and awkward hair — a world away from the good looks showcased in “From Dawn to Dusk” (1996), or her Oscar-nominated performance as Frida Kahlo in “Frida” (2002).
Beatriz’s immigrant status reflects the kinds of debates now commonplace in Donald Trump’s America, and fueled by the president’s promise to deport 3 million “illegal immigrants” and build a wall on the border with Mexico.
America’s rich-poor divide is sharply depicted in the film: The petite, plain-Jane Beatriz is clearly out of place with the tall, white, well-manicured women in high heels and their husbands, who smoke cigars as they discuss business deals.
“I love this character because it represents so many people,” Hayek, who is of Mexican and Lebanese descent, told AFP in a telephone interview in Spanish.