Iván Monalisa is a free spirit. A young promise, writer and playwright in Chile, arrived in New York more than 17 years ago.
Iván Monalisa is a free spirit. Considered a young promise, artist, writer and playwright in Chile, she has been living as an undocumented immigrant for more than 17 years and engaged in prostitution in the streets of New York. Monalisa, an expression of her male-female identity, was born from the pre-9/11 drag scene and night life. Director and protagonist set out on a journey together to understand the reasons that led Ivan to self-exile and to build her identity on the sidelines.
The reunion with Nicole Costa, the director of the documentary and Iván's former university colleague, brings out and explores new creative processes and an immediate connection between the two. This new bond brings new opportunities for Monalisa as a performer and writer as she struggles to legalize her situation in the country. Through their telephone conversations, archival footage of old VHS tapes, and fragments of Monalisa's writings, we get a glimpse of her "double spirit", as she describes it, a restless personality who chose to get lost in casual sex and addictions to find and build her identity.
*** This film contains explicit sex scenes.**
