Desi

Desi is a cheerful 11-year-old who goes to school every day and has fun with her classmates. She seems a lot like the other girls, but when the bell rings and all the other children have gone home, Desi stays behind with her cell phone in hand. This is because she still has to figure out where she is going to sleep. Desi's mother died when she was a baby, and her father Harry, an unemployed loafer, lives together with his girlfriend Esther on a dirty houseboat. Harry and Esther argue all the time. Desi has her own room there, but she is not always welcome. She can also sleep at Harry's mother's house or at her mom's father's place, but she prefers to spend the night at her best friend's. This is the way Desi's life is -- it wasn't her idea, but she never complains, only wonders. She listens as her father tells her what happened to her mother, and she and her grandpa look at old pictures of her mom. Director Maria Ramos follows Desi closely but she never intervenes. No questions are asked, and there are no voice-overs. In this way, we are gradually introduced to Desi's everyday life, which seems completely ordinary to her.