The Muleteer dazzles but stumbles in its storytelling, leaving its queer and historical themes frustratingly underdeveloped.
Director Isabel Cristina Fregoso highlights the importance of women in Mexican history and materializes queer stories lived in silence, but the plot of The Muleteer (La Arriera) is riddled with contradictions that undermine the film’s emotional depth and narrative cohesion. Its screening on Feb. 8 marked the closing film of ReelOut film festival.
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Against landscapes of Mexico’s Jalisco highlands, The Muleteer follows Emilia, who escapes her adoptive family in pursuit of freedom and finding her biological father. Set in the 1930s, and disguising herself as a male muleteer—an individual who transports goods using mules—Emilia contends with her own identity and conflicting desires.
What unfolds is a story that captures depths of longing, sadness, and the weight of history against the backdrop of the Mexican Revolution. Emilia’s disguise as a muleteer isn’t just a survival tactic, but a means of exploring autonomy in a world that offers women little of it. Yet, the story loses its way and ultimately struggles to find an emotional core.
Visually and technically, The Muleteer is breathtaking. The score blends seamlessly with the visuals, and the cinematography captures the grandeur of Emilia’s story. Every frame is meticulously composed, offering stills that wouldn’t look out of place in a museum.
However, beneath its visual splendor, the storytelling feels disted. Fregoso attempts to explore sexual awakening, critique male weakness derived from toxic masculinity, and examine the constraints of gender roles. At the same time, the film depicts sacrifices demanded by survival in a period piece where the only queer representation is an intimate relationship between two adopted sisters, Caro and Emilia. It’s a collection of many ideas that fail to materialize.
One of the most compelling aspects of The Muleteer is its engagement with gender and queerness in the context of the Mexican Revolution. The film hints at deeper questions of identity and desire, particularly in how Emilia interacts with other men and women while disguised. However, these themes remain underexplored.
The choice not to explore queerness in a nuanced way, but rather via a relationship between two adopted sisters, feels limiting and uncomfortable. While their connection is one of deep longing and shared survival, it sidesteps the opportunity to depict queer love beyond a bond that carries inherently familial implications. This portrayal makes the representation feel more like an afterthought than a meaningful exploration of queer identity.
Emilia’s journey should be emotionally gripping, yet her internal struggles remain frustratingly distant. The characters are often more symbolic than deeply developed, and the plot slips through the viewer’s fingers.
Beyond its thematic shortcomings, The Muleteer also falters structurally. Emilia’s initial quest to find her biological father sets the film in motion, but as the story progresses, this central plot point becomes muddled by a series of diversions. She becomes entangled in detours that, while sometimes thematically rich, ultimately detract from the urgency of her search.
What begins as a deeply personal hunt transforms into a fragmented series of loosely connected events, making it difficult for the audience to stay invested in her original goal.
Caro, Emilia’s lover and adopted sister since birth, is abruptly reintroduced in the final act, forcing the story into a rushed and unsatisfying conclusion. Emilia’s decision to return to the circumstances she initially fled undermines much of the film’s initial tension, feeling both anti-climactic and frustratingly circular.
The emotional weight the film attempts to inject into its final moments feels unearned, leaving the audience with more confusion than catharsis.
There are moments that suggest The Muleteer could’ve been a powerful examination of queerness in a time of upheaval, but the film hesitates to fully commit to this exploration. Instead, it’s weighed down by its own ambition—striving to say something profound yet failing to anchor its themes within the nuances of Emilia’s experience.
What remains is a film of striking imagery and fleeting moments of brilliance, but one that ultimately struggles to find its voice.
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