Thesis on a domestication, a film based on a novel of the same name written and adapted by the film’s lead, acclaimed Argentine trans author Camila Sosa Villada, will have its world premiere at the 60th Chicago International Film Festival, the movie’s US distributor Cinema Tropical announced on Tuesday. The festival kicks off later this week.

An actress and playwright, Sosa Villada became a best-selling author in 2019 with her second novel, The Bad Ones, which follows a group of transvestite sex workers in Córdoba. The book was translated into a dozen languages and catapulted her career, earning her the Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz Prize, previously awarded to such luminaries as Claudia Piñeiro, Gioconda Belli, and Almudena Grandes. 

Produced by Gael García Bernal, Diego Luna, Laura Huberman, Ramiro Pavón, and Javier van de Couter, the film adaptation will be an entrant in the festival’s OutLook Competition, which runs October 16 to 27.

Thesis on a Domestication stars Sosa Villada as a successful Argentine trans actress reveling in the prestige her writing career has wrought. Her character finds love with a lawyer played by Mexican actor Alfonso Herrera (Ozark), whom she marries. Camila and her husband successfully adopt a child, defying the conservative community in Argentina, but their pursuit of domestic happiness is thwarted during a visit to the actress’s hometown.

This is Sosa Villada’s second film lead role, following van de Couter’s debut feature Mia, which premiered in 2011. His second film, Implosión (2021), won the Grand Prize for best Argentine film at the 21st Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival.

Thesis on a domestication was originally published by newspaper Página/12 in 2019. Following Sosa Villada’s success, an extended version of her first novel was republished in 2023 by Tusquets Editores, the same house that published The Bad Ones.

“Thesis on a Domestication explores the stigmatization of AIDS, desire, eroticism, and the family ties of a trans actress, set against the backdrop of her public persona and her attempt to create a domestic life,” Cinema Tropical noted in its press release. 

“The protagonist seeks what has long been denied to trans women: both safety and happiness.”