Jayro Bustamante’s “Rita” (2024) is a Guatemalan magical realist horror film that fits smugly in the dark fantasy genre bracket. Written and directed by Bustamante, it is now streaming on Shudder. The film revolves around a 13-year-old girl who finds herself trapped in a government institution after running away from her abusive father’s house. While claiming to be safe for girls like her, the institution hides its uglier side, guided by a deeply regressive mindset. The film critiques these societal foes using fantastical elements. It portrays these girls as angels with wings, summoned by witches. These angels need to fit in a mold to be ideal. If not, they are forced to feel ashamed of themselves. If you are wondering what happens in the final moments, see the ending explained here.
Spoilers Ahead
Rita (2024) Plot Summary & Movie Synopsis:
“Rita” on Shudder is a magical realist horror film that follows a young girl who escapes her abusive father’s house to stay imprisoned in an establishment that is supposed to keep her safe and secure.
What happens in ‘Rita’, the Guatemalan film?
The Guatemalan film, “Rita” begins with its 13-year-old protagonist, Rita (Giuliana Santa Cruz) being taken to a government facility. She ran away from her home to leave her abusive father behind. However, the government intervened to bring her to a place surrounded by forests. Although she escaped a tortuous place, she was forced to enter another one. She imagines her life as a fairy tale with fantastical beings like angels, ogres, and witches. In this institution, she receives angelic wings and so do the other girls trapped there. Initially, she finds it difficult to bond with them.
As Rita enters the house, the girls bully her into submission. Some girls have clean-feathered wings and are supposed to act like angels. The others, mainly with darker wings, are treated like undesirable outcasts. Unlike them, Rita and other angels are tasked with sewing clothes. They all are forced to follow the rigid regulations akin to a third-world exploitative sweatshop. While coping with the strictness of her environment, she also gets bullied by other angels. So, she struggles to maintain her sanity. However, over time, Rita befriends other angels who accept her as a part of their herd in the shelter, which imprisons them.
Rita’s Turmoil in the Shelter
As Rita grows closer to her peers inside the shelter, she starts seeing different sides of them. The girls rebel against the wardens for the unfair, inhumane practices they perpetrate on a daily basis. The wardens show them no mercy. Instead, they take away whatever little privileges the girls have. Since Rita is a new joiner, the other girls toil her. They alienate her when they all are forced to wipe the floors with their sleeping sheets. Soon after, the female warden takes Rita to meet a witch, an authority figure in this facility.
The witch asks Rita about the pain her cruel father subjected her to. Rita is forced to share in detail about how her father abused her and raped her and her sister. Whenever she got pregnant, he forced her to get abortions. At just 13 years old, she had to go through the excruciating pain of multiple abortions because of this monstrous man. Despite the depth of Rita’s trauma, the witch asks her questions that invalidate and insult her pain. The witch derives a sadistic pleasure from hearing Rita’s story. Rita is mature enough to understand that. So, she spits on the witch, who slaps her in response.
Rita lets other girls know of the witch’s slap and refuses to back down from rebelling against the authority figures who keep suppressing their voices. Even at night, when she goes to the bathroom, a guard threatens to slit her throat. So, some girls mystically arrive there for her safety. Rita later learns that they are ‘the Stars,’ girls who are prohibited from entering their facility because they are dying and are thus considered unfit according to the staff. Regardless, the angels stand in solidarity with Rita and with each other in a united front.
Rita (2024) Movie Ending Explained:
After spending a while in the government facility, Rita gets a visit from a relative. She notices bruises on Rita’s body and realizes that Rita is suffering even in her new home. However, Rita is more concerned about her sister, who is still stuck with her father. The facility members expect her to be a part of their promotional video. They postpone it, considering her visible bruises. Instead of being concerned about her well-being, they are rather concerned about how the bruises impact others’ perceptions. While learning about the tortures they inflict, Rita also gets to know about the Stars and their miserable state.
Shortly after, Rita is again asked to be part of a photo shoot. While there, she is forced to sell herself as an object of desire for men. Not just the male guards, but a female associate shares this evil mindset and wants Rita to behave properly. As time passes, Rita and other girls seek help from their well-wishing visitors to escape the institution. Soon, when a male guard tries to take advantage of her innocence, other girls interrupt him. Still, it doesn’t stop him from stooping lower and submitting to his sick perversion. So, Rita stabs this monster.
Can Rita and other angels escape the exploitative institution?
Despite the guard’s mistake, Rita receives no sympathy but disciplinary action. It makes the girls even more determined to break free from their confines. One day, they distract the guards to run out to the nearest town. However, they are soon caught and brought back to the facility. They are treated like animals in cages and are forced to remain inside a room. The staff starves them and limits whatever little privileges they have to break their spirits. Instead, it revitalizes it and makes them take a bold step.
The girls burn some things inside the room, hoping it will lead guards to open the room. The staff, however, shows them no mercy and lets them burn themselves to death. At the end of the film, Rita and the other angels cannot escape the institution. However, they help bring the truth to light and lead to the arrests of the monsters that tortured them while claiming to be their saviors.
