Film Forum

Grocery store employees, today’s essential workers, get star treatment in MY DARLING SUPERMARKET (made prior to the pandemic). Set within a bright, colorful supermercado in São Paulo, Brazil, this charming, funny documentary glides through a seemingly endless array of vibrantly designed shelves and displays, but it’s the store’s employees who take center stage. Rodrigo (in bread) discusses quantum physics and parallel universes; Santo (a forklift operator) builds video game cities; a security officer tracks possible shoplifters on closed circuit TVs (“Two suspects near the condensed milk!”); Ivan (a baker) is into Manga cosplay; and then there’s the artist who lovingly paints the prices. A panoply of individuals with fears, hopes, and questions about their place in the universe are celebrated in a quirky portrait that juxtaposes their idiosyncrasies with the assumed mundanity of bringing food to our table.

BRAZIL / DENMARK     2019     80 MINS.     IN PORTUGUESE WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES    CINEMA TROPICAL

Virtual Cinema program supported by the Robert Gore Rifkind Foundation.

Reviews

“Makes virtue of the confined spaces of the store, stocking up on stories and philosophy from the people who work there while always keeping an eye out for the artistic and cinematic…[with] universal appeal, inventive camerawork and offbeat storytelling. [Filmmaker Tali] Yankelevich has a keen interest in the sort of detail others might overlook. Taps into the various rhythms of the store...so that the pace is always changing. Yankelevich loves every inch of this supermarket and her interest, in turn, endears it to us. You’ll look at the guy behind the bakery counter differently the next time you do your shopping.”
– Amber Wilkinson, Screen International

“Almost whimsical at times. Following the day-to-day of workers in the São Paulo supermarket, it depicts their repetition-based activities with wry humor.”
– Dan Schindel, Hyperallergic