Abuse, Success & Strength in ‘Mon Laferte, Te Amo’ Documentary: Why ‘Talking About My Mother Was Healing’ for the Singer-Songwriter

Telling her story in a documentary was not difficult for Mon Laferte. On the contrary, the Chilean-Mexican singer-songwriter tells Billboard Español, narrating part of her past in front of a camera provoked “a certain nostalgia,” mainly when remembering her pregnancy and the birth of her son.

“I think how crazy I was, going singing when I was three months pregnant, with my belly all over the place — and then with my baby, three months after birth, and I was on stage!” the artist explains from Mexico City, with a chuckle.

Mon Laferte, Te Amo, which arrived on Netflix on Thursday (August 1), is an intimate portrait in which the singer of “El Beso” and “Tu Falta de Querer” reveals details of her professional and personal life, from her crude childhood and her start as a singer in her native Viña del Mar, to her arrival in Mexico in 2007, and how she managed to become a Latin music star. But it is, above all, “a story of strength, of resilience,” she says.

Directed by Camila Grandi and Joanna Reposi Garibaldi, the documentary finds Laferte in the middle of an international tour, just weeks away from becoming a mother. In the back and forth between stages, dressing rooms and her home, Norma Monserrat Bustamante Laferte (her real name) recalls a complex childhood, marked by the abandonment of her father and economic struggles, as well as the differences that distanced her from her mother at a young age.

Then, a painful event caused an even greater estrangement with her mother, who was involved in a relationship with an alcoholic man who used domestic violence and abused Laferte sexually, the artist narrates in her biographical chronicle.

“Talking about my mother in a documentary was very healing,” she says. “I’ve had a difficult relationship with her, at times of much love, and at times of friction, of disagreements with her since I was a child. But over the years, I understand her much more, and today there is greater empathy.”

Motherhood is undoubtedly the common thread in Mon Laferte, Te Amo — where the figures of her grandmother, her mother and herself as a new mom are the protagonists.

The artist compares her experience to that of Beyoncé, whose documentary Homecoming (2019) records the days leading up to her highly anticipated performance at the 2018 Coachella Festival and the emotional path the American superstar and also mother went through, from creative concept to the concert’s moment.

“I remember in the documentary, she was rehearsing all day, she was with her baby, and in my ignorance I thought, ‘She should go home to rest, and then come back,’” Laferte says. “But when I became a mom, I understood her a lot because there is something about needing to feel again like yourself before pregnancy and giving birth.”

Other passages in Mon Laferte, Te Amo talk about her life after leaving school, her beginnings as a singer in local bars in Chile and her relationship with a man 21 years older than her who soon became her first manager, and she the victim of emotional and economic abuse.

It also tells of her time on Rojo, the Chilean National Television show that made her known, and her arrival in Mexico, where she had to start over again years later to conquer the most important music market in the Hispanic world.

“Many women can see themselves reflected in this documentary, we go through the same things,” says the four-time Latin Grammy winner. “Not all of them are singers, but it is like the daily life of a woman — facing the challenges that society demands of us, and that we demand of ourselves.

“I demand a lot from myself to be a great artist, but also to be the best mother in the world,” she adds with a smile.

Mon Laferte’s documentary arrives as the Chilean star — and naturalized Mexican, as of November 2022 — continues her Autopoiética Tour in support of her 2023 album of the same name.

Mon Laferte was also just confirmed to participate at the 2024 Billboard Latin Music Week, which will be held Oct. 14-18 at The Fillmore Miami Beach at Jackie Gleason in Miami Beach, Florida.

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