Olivia is a very compelling and complex character who's dealing with timeless yet very timely issues. Isabel Sandoval wrote, directed and stars in the deeply affecting film.

| Dec 1, 2021

Isabel Sandoval's deeply poignant and clearly very personal story is a marvel, bringing a lyrical intimacy and a sensuality to the grit of a social-justice drama.

| Dec 1, 2021

Isabel Sandoval has created a subtle, sensual story that goes beyond the trans narratives released by largely white, male, cis-gendered mainstream directors of today.

| Dec 1, 2021

That trans filmmaker Sandoval also stars as Olivia - these are her real experiences, her real feelings - gives the film a bracing authenticity which makes the horrifying inhumanity of Olivia's situation even more difficult to bear.

| Dec 1, 2021

Intimate, personal stories like Olivia's are the kind that have a way of making the biggest impact:...

| Dec 1, 2021

A mesmerizing, often terrifying slice of social realism from a filmmaker in complete control of the world she's depicting.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 28, 2021

Ably performed all round, with a strong turn from [Isabel] Sandoval in the lead, this is a timely reflection on how it feels to be an outsider in the land of the free.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Feb 16, 2021

The film is remarkable in how it focuses on people that we rarely see onscreen.

| Original Score: 7/10 | Feb 1, 2021

In Lingua Franca, that villainization is replaced with empathy. Immigration is not constantly scrutinized, joked about, and shamed.

| Jan 28, 2021

The film inherits a symbolic baton from Chantal Akerman's News From Home in its deft and touching depiction of a woman almost entirely separated from her roots, tethered only by the words of her mother.

| Jan 26, 2021

It's also an empathic portrait of a man whose bid at redemption hinges on going against everything that Trump-era America stands for.

| Jan 25, 2021

Lingua Franca's power resides [in its depictions of] lost souls confronting impossible choices that pit their comfort against their humanity.

| Original Score: 8/10 | Dec 28, 2020

This story has never been told before, communicated in this way or created by such an astute and perceptive writer/director/actor like Isabel Sandoval.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Dec 18, 2020

Sandoval sells Olivia's perspective in brief and remarkable performance notes.

| Nov 17, 2020

LINGUA FRANCA is an important film, not just in the sense of representation, but also in the way it portrays the relationship between xenophobic and transphobic logics

| Oct 22, 2020

Drama about undocumented woman has language, nudity.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Oct 19, 2020

A real immigration story in the U.S.A.. A film made by trueness. A must. [Full review in Spanish]

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 20, 2020

Lingua Franca is almost voyeuristic. With Sandoval spreading herself between acting, directing, writing, editing, and producing, the film is inherently intimate.

| Sep 12, 2020

The expression here is one of shared humanity regardless of background, gender identity, race or creed. The common language being used here is cinema.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | Sep 10, 2020

Lingua Franca might be a fictional film, but it accurately shows situations and feelings experienced by an untold number of transgender undocumented immigrants.

| Sep 6, 2020