{ "id": "ep85f47z7k", "slug": "la-tarea", "title": "La Tarea", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.erotic-thrillers-and-dramas", "label": "Erotic thrillers and dramas", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.erotic-thrillers-and-dramas" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Latin America and the Caribbean · 1946 to 2000: Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "path": [ { "id": "geo.latam", "label": "Latin America and the Caribbean", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946", "label": "Latin America and the Caribbean · 1946 to 2000", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.latam.t1946.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" } ] } ], "excerpt": "La tarea (Homework) is a 1990 Mexican comedy-drama by Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, starring María Rojo and José Alonso, about a film student secretly videotaping her reunion with her ex-lover; notable for its three long fixed-camera takes and 1991 festival awards.", "snippet": "La tarea (Homework) is a 1990 Mexican comedy-drama by Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, starring María Rojo and José Alonso, about a film student secretly videotaping her reunion with her ex-lover; notable for its three long fixed-camera takes and 1991 festival awards.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.erotic-thrillers-and-dramas", "markdown": "# La Tarea\n\n**La tarea** (English title: *Homework*) is a 1990 Mexican comedy-drama directed and written by Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, starring María Rojo and José Alonso. Virginia, a film student, hides a running video camera to record the amorous reunion she has arranged with Marcelo, her ex-husband, whom she has not seen for four years, ostensibly to complete an assignment for her film school; Marcelo is tender and seductive with her until he discovers what he is being used for.[1](https://tv.apple.com/mx/movie/la-tarea/umc.cmc.3llvkkd0fc8g0ke4swnvfrwb2) The film carries the longer alternate title *La tarea o De cómo la pornografía salvó del tedio y mejoró la economía de la familia Partida*.[2](https://www.cine.com/pelicula/la-tarea)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Director and writer | Jaime Humberto Hermosillo[1](https://tv.apple.com/mx/movie/la-tarea/umc.cmc.3llvkkd0fc8g0ke4swnvfrwb2) |\n| Cast | María Rojo as Virginia/María; José Alonso as Marcelo/Pepe[3](https://playmax.mx/la-tarea-f12857/credits) |\n| Production | Clasa Films Mundiales; producers Pablo and Francisco Barbachano, executive producer Lourdes Rivera[3](https://playmax.mx/la-tarea-f12857/credits) |\n| Release | 23 August 1991 in Mexico; 8 January 1992 at the Renoir cinema, Madrid[4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/) • [5](https://www.filmoteca.org/pelicula-la-tarea.htm) |\n| Runtime | 85 minutes (some listings give 84 minutes)[5](https://www.filmoteca.org/pelicula-la-tarea.htm) • [4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/) |\n| Form | Three long takes, one around 40 minutes, shot with a fixed camera from a single framing[6](https://elpais.com/diario/1992/01/18/cultura/695689204_850215.html) |\n| Recognition | Alcatraz de Oro for direction at Cartagena; Special Jury Prize at Moscow; Ariel nomination for Best Actor (José Alonso)[7](https://tesiunamdocumentos.dgb.unam.mx/pmig2016/0183266/0183266.pdf) • [8](https://es.hispanopedia.com/wiki/La_tarea) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot and premise\n\nVirginia has attended a film school and, as a graduation exercise, decides to film her encounter with Marcelo, her ex-husband, whom she has not seen in four years. Before the meeting she carefully prepares the staging: the lighting, the position of the cameras, everything arranged to carry the exercise to its last consequences and also to film a possible sexual encounter.[9](https://www.cineol.net/pelicula/la-tarea) In the film's opening, a woman dressed in black tights and a red skirt conceals a camera under a table in the front room of a middle-class apartment in Mexico; from the couple's conversation it emerges that she lives alone, he is divorced with a six-year-old son, and they had a sexual relationship four years earlier.[10](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/companion-to-latin-american-film/la-tarea-homework-1989-directed-by-jaime-humberto-hermosillo/0CF017BB61A62D7689B53CC407224DA2)\n\nThe premise places the viewer in the position of the hidden camera. An audience review collected by Rotten Tomatoes describes the film as conceived as a single sequence shot with disguised cuts, putting the spectator in a position of total voyeurism from the concealed camera.[11](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/la-tarea)\n\n## Form and production\n\nThe film's formal experiment is its defining feature. The Spanish critic Ángel Fernández-Santos, reviewing the Madrid premiere for *El País*, noted that *La tarea* is composed of only three sequence shots, one of them around 40 minutes long, taken with a fixed camera in time simultaneous with the spectator's and from a single framing point; an ordinary film, he observed, usually contains dozens of sequences made up of many hundreds of shots and framing points.[6](https://elpais.com/diario/1992/01/18/cultura/695689204_850215.html) He compared the device to Hitchcock's *Rope* and concluded that, despite its formal austerity, the film plays with the ease and lightness of conventional entertainment cinema, using the interplay between what is seen on screen and what is inferred to happen off-screen.[6](https://elpais.com/diario/1992/01/18/cultura/695689204_850215.html)\n\n**A rapid shoot.** According to IMDb's trivia, the film was shot in only four days.[4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/) A UNAM thesis on low-budget Mexican cinema records the preparation that preceded it: [Hermosillo](https://www.edgepedia.org/hermosillo), María Rojo, and José Alonso held talks, script readings, and character analysis, followed by a week of rehearsals on video, so that by the end of that week a video version of *La tarea* existed, which the two actors studied at home over a weekend before the definitive shoot.[7](https://tesiunamdocumentos.dgb.unam.mx/pmig2016/0183266/0183266.pdf)\n\nThe technical crew included Toni Kuhn as director of photography, Luis Arcaraz composing the original music, Nerio Barberis as sound editor, and Laura Santa Cruz as art director.[3](https://playmax.mx/la-tarea-f12857/credits) The Cambridge *Companion to Latin American Film* chapter on the film also credits the songs \"Bonita\" and \"Superstición\" by Luis Arcaraz and \"Momento\" by Los Hermanos Martínez Gil.[10](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/companion-to-latin-american-film/la-tarea-homework-1989-directed-by-jaime-humberto-hermosillo/0CF017BB61A62D7689B53CC407224DA2) The film was shot on 35 mm in color.[5](https://www.filmoteca.org/pelicula-la-tarea.htm)\n\n## Release and reception\n\nThe film premiered in Mexico on 23 August 1991.[4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/) In Spain it opened on 8 January 1992 at the Renoir cinema in Madrid, classified as not recommended for viewers under eighteen; it sold 21,278 tickets there with receipts of 47,886.62.[5](https://www.filmoteca.org/pelicula-la-tarea.htm) SensaCine lists the Spanish cinema release as 10 January 1992 and gives the film a user rating of 3.2 from 36 ratings.[12](https://www.sensacine.com/peliculas/pelicula-6440/) On Rotten Tomatoes the Tomatometer stands at 44% from two critic reviews; Emanuel Levy gave it 3 out of 5, and Rene Jordan of *El Nuevo Herald* praised its \"extremely ingenious conclusion\".[11](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/la-tarea) IMDb lists 4 wins and 3 nominations in total and a user score of 6.3 from 882 votes.[4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/)\n\n## Festival run and awards\n\nDuring 1991 the film traveled to major international festivals. According to the UNAM thesis, it screened out of competition in the Panorama section of the 41st [Berlin International Film Festival](https://www.edgepedia.org/berlin-international-film-festival) in February; won the Alcatraz de Oro for direction at the 31st Cartagena International Film Festival in Colombia in March; took the Bachica de Oro for Best Actress at the International Film Week in Bogotá; received a Special Jury Prize at the 17th Moscow International Film Festival in July; and won the Silver... for Best Director at the 37th Taormina Film Festival in Italy, also in July. It competed as Mexico's entry to be among the five films nominated for the Oscar for best foreign-language film and was nominated for the Ariel for Best Actor.[7](https://tesiunamdocumentos.dgb.unam.mx/pmig2016/0183266/0183266.pdf) Hispanopedia records the Ariel de Plata nomination for Best Actor for José Alonso and a Special Mention at the Moscow festival for Hermosillo.[8](https://es.hispanopedia.com/wiki/La_tarea) Cine.com lists one 1992 Ariel nomination, for Best Actor.[2](https://www.cine.com/pelicula/la-tarea)\n\n## The director and the film's place\n\nJaime Humberto Hermosillo Delgado was born in [Aguascalientes](https://www.edgepedia.org/aguascalientes) in 1942 and died on 13 January 2020 at the age of 77. The Cineteca Nacional describes him as one of the first LGBTTI voices in Mexican cinema, whose films explored facets made invisible by Mexico's conservative morality, and *La tarea* (dated 1990 in its retrospective listing) among the titles of his peak period, screened in 35 mm prints during a 2020 homage cycle.[13](https://www.cinetecanacional.net/noticiaPrensa.php?accion=nota&id=1124) A dissertation on Mexican national cinema records that *La Tarea* became a popular and commercial success in Mexico and marked a significant departure from the traditional industrial model of Mexican film production, given Hermosillo's working context and limited resources.[14](https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk1/tape7/PQDD_0001/MQ43392.pdf) After the film's recognitions, Hermosillo chose not to repeat its formula and filmed *Encuentro inesperado* in 1991, again for Clasa Films.[7](https://tesiunamdocumentos.dgb.unam.mx/pmig2016/0183266/0183266.pdf) The film was followed by *La tarea prohibida* (1992).[4](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/)\n\n## References\n\n1. [La tarea, Apple TV (Mexico)](https://tv.apple.com/mx/movie/la-tarea/umc.cmc.3llvkkd0fc8g0ke4swnvfrwb2)\n2. [La tarea, Cine.com](https://www.cine.com/pelicula/la-tarea)\n3. [Reparto y equipo de La tarea (1991), PlayMax](https://playmax.mx/la-tarea-f12857/credits)\n4. [La tarea (1990), IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/es-es/title/tt0100746/)\n5. [La Tarea, ficha técnica, Filmoteca](https://www.filmoteca.org/pelicula-la-tarea.htm)\n6. [Ángel Fernández-Santos, \"Divertida y singular comedia\", El País, 18 January 1992](https://elpais.com/diario/1992/01/18/cultura/695689204_850215.html)\n7. [La renovación del cine mexicano a través de películas de búsqueda realizadas con bajos costos, UNAM thesis](https://tesiunamdocumentos.dgb.unam.mx/pmig2016/0183266/0183266.pdf)\n8. [La tarea, Hispanopedia](https://es.hispanopedia.com/wiki/La_tarea)\n9. [La tarea (1991), CINeol](https://www.cineol.net/pelicula/la-tarea)\n10. [La Tarea (Homework, 1989), Directed by Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, A Companion to Latin American Film, Cambridge University Press](https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/companion-to-latin-american-film/la-tarea-homework-1989-directed-by-jaime-humberto-hermosillo/0CF017BB61A62D7689B53CC407224DA2)\n11. [Homework, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/la-tarea)\n12. [La tarea, Película 1991, SensaCine](https://www.sensacine.com/peliculas/pelicula-6440/)\n13. [Cineteca Nacional presentará retrospectiva de Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, 23 January 2020](https://www.cinetecanacional.net/noticiaPrensa.php?accion=nota&id=1124)\n14. [Nation, Nation-State, National Cinema, dissertation, Library and Archives Canada](https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk1/tape7/PQDD_0001/MQ43392.pdf)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Erotic thrillers and dramas*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"La Tarea\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[La Tarea](https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea](https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"La Tarea\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/la-tarea. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "La tarea is a 1990 Mexican comedy-drama by Jaime Humberto Hermosillo, starring María Rojo and José Alonso, about a film student secretly videotaping her reunion with her ex-lover; notable for its three long fixed-camera takes and 1991 festival awards." }