Miami– Gaumont USA, producer of “Narcos,” is powering up new series from both Oscar-winning “Birdman” co-writer Armando Bó and also Spain’s Manuel Martin Cuenca, director of Toronto winner “The Motive,” as well as multiple other talents. It is also readying it first movie slate.
Gaumont USA already co-produced the Bó showrun Amazon Original “El Presidente,” with Pablo and Juan de Dios Larraín’s Fabula and Argentine powerhouse Kapow, both partners on “La Jauría.”
News of new series projects comes as Gaumont USA is advancing on Lucía Puenzo’s near future android family saga “Futuro Desierto” (“Desolate Future”), part of a 2020 multi-project development pact with the Argentine writer-director.
Gaumont USA is currently developing titles with Jimena Montemayor (“Wind Traces”), Pedro Amorim (“The Dognapper”), Sebastian and Emiliano Zurita (“How to Survive Being Single”), Katina Medina Mora, Belen Macias (“Verano en Rojo”), among other top-level filmmakers. Other projects are from screenwriters Ruth García...
Gaumont USA already co-produced the Bó showrun Amazon Original “El Presidente,” with Pablo and Juan de Dios Larraín’s Fabula and Argentine powerhouse Kapow, both partners on “La Jauría.”
News of new series projects comes as Gaumont USA is advancing on Lucía Puenzo’s near future android family saga “Futuro Desierto” (“Desolate Future”), part of a 2020 multi-project development pact with the Argentine writer-director.
Gaumont USA is currently developing titles with Jimena Montemayor (“Wind Traces”), Pedro Amorim (“The Dognapper”), Sebastian and Emiliano Zurita (“How to Survive Being Single”), Katina Medina Mora, Belen Macias (“Verano en Rojo”), among other top-level filmmakers. Other projects are from screenwriters Ruth García...
- 1/24/2024
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
Exclusive: TelevisaUnivision streamer ViX+ has ordered a relationship drama about two mothers fighting the urge to be together.
We can reveal Latinx producer The Immigrant is working on Todo lo Que Fuimos, starring Esmeralda Pimentel, Fátima Molina, Michel Brown and Margarita Muñoz.
The story follows two women with a secret past, with themes touching on relationships, Lgbtia+ issues and family. Shooting took place in Mexico and New York and production wrapped last week.
Here’s the synopsis: “Natalia and Gala are two mothers who don’t seem to have anything in common, except their children go to the same school. Natalia is the perfect Mexican mom, married to Bruno, the perfect husband and father. Gala is a Chicana from New York who just moved to Mexico with Isa, her wife. But Natalia and Gala keep a secret: years ago, they had a relationship that changed their lives. Now they try...
We can reveal Latinx producer The Immigrant is working on Todo lo Que Fuimos, starring Esmeralda Pimentel, Fátima Molina, Michel Brown and Margarita Muñoz.
The story follows two women with a secret past, with themes touching on relationships, Lgbtia+ issues and family. Shooting took place in Mexico and New York and production wrapped last week.
Here’s the synopsis: “Natalia and Gala are two mothers who don’t seem to have anything in common, except their children go to the same school. Natalia is the perfect Mexican mom, married to Bruno, the perfect husband and father. Gala is a Chicana from New York who just moved to Mexico with Isa, her wife. But Natalia and Gala keep a secret: years ago, they had a relationship that changed their lives. Now they try...
- 10/18/2023
- by Jesse Whittock
- Deadline Film + TV
Mexican filmmaker Sofía Auza revisits her 2019 short in debut feature “Adolfo,” produced by The Immigrant, and about to be introduced to buyers at MipCancun.
Starring Juan Daniel García Treviño – also spotted in Netflix’s “I’m No Longer Here” – and Rocío de la Mañana, it sees two strangers meeting at a bus stop on the worst, or maybe the best night of their lives.
Hugo is on the way to his father’s funeral, Momo just got out of rehab. Together, they set out on a surprising adventure, with one goal in mind: fFinding a new home for a cactus named Adolfo.
“Adolfo is the most important part of the story!’,” Auza tells Variety.
“It’s the one thing Hugo has left from his dad. It’s not a flower, it’s not exactly beautiful. He describes it as the ugliest plant in the world, but he’s not ready to let go of it.
Starring Juan Daniel García Treviño – also spotted in Netflix’s “I’m No Longer Here” – and Rocío de la Mañana, it sees two strangers meeting at a bus stop on the worst, or maybe the best night of their lives.
Hugo is on the way to his father’s funeral, Momo just got out of rehab. Together, they set out on a surprising adventure, with one goal in mind: fFinding a new home for a cactus named Adolfo.
“Adolfo is the most important part of the story!’,” Auza tells Variety.
“It’s the one thing Hugo has left from his dad. It’s not a flower, it’s not exactly beautiful. He describes it as the ugliest plant in the world, but he’s not ready to let go of it.
- 11/11/2022
- by Marta Balaga
- Variety Film + TV
Exclusive: Lionsgate+ has renewed Señorita 89 for a second season and has added Dolores Heredia (El Galán) and Yoshira Escárrega (Toda La Sangre) as series regulars. Production will kick off on October 17 in Mexico City.
Heredia will portray La Madrina, mother of the cartels, who sees power and influence in Jocelyn (Leidi Gutiérrez), and Yoshira Escárrega as Maribel Montaño, who is known as La Santa because the night they found her with her victim’s eyes in her hands, they say the dead man could still see.
In the first season of Señorita 89, Isabel (Natasha Dupeyrón) was crowned; Dolores died (Bárbara López); Elena (Ximena Romo) went into exile and Concepción’s (Ilse Salas) La Encantada empire fell apart.
When Season 2 premieres, the ‘90s are in full swing and the two main TV networks in Mexico find themselves in a war to impose the next queen. While Miss Yucatan (Dupeyrón) tries to...
Heredia will portray La Madrina, mother of the cartels, who sees power and influence in Jocelyn (Leidi Gutiérrez), and Yoshira Escárrega as Maribel Montaño, who is known as La Santa because the night they found her with her victim’s eyes in her hands, they say the dead man could still see.
In the first season of Señorita 89, Isabel (Natasha Dupeyrón) was crowned; Dolores died (Bárbara López); Elena (Ximena Romo) went into exile and Concepción’s (Ilse Salas) La Encantada empire fell apart.
When Season 2 premieres, the ‘90s are in full swing and the two main TV networks in Mexico find themselves in a war to impose the next queen. While Miss Yucatan (Dupeyrón) tries to...
- 10/12/2022
- by Rosy Cordero
- Deadline Film + TV
L.A.-based Spanish-language streaming platform Pantaya and global streamer Starzplay have revealed that production is underway on the period new drama series “Señorita 89” from Fremantle and the Larraín brothers’ Fabula, the latest co-production stemming from a first-look deal between the two, dating back to 2019.
The first fruit of that combined labor was global hit series “La Jauria,” available on Amazon Prime Video in Latin America and HBO Max in the U.S. Selected as one of Variety’s best international series of 2020, “La Jauria” stars “A Fantastic Woman” lead Daniela Vega and is directed by one of Latin America’s most prominent film and TV writer-directors Lucia Puenzo.
Sticking with a talent alliance that worked so well for Fabula and Fremantle the first time around, Puenzo also co-wrote and is directing “Señorita 89.” She is joined by co-screenwriters María Renée Prudencio and Tatiana Mereñuk, and co-directors Nicolás Puenzo...
The first fruit of that combined labor was global hit series “La Jauria,” available on Amazon Prime Video in Latin America and HBO Max in the U.S. Selected as one of Variety’s best international series of 2020, “La Jauria” stars “A Fantastic Woman” lead Daniela Vega and is directed by one of Latin America’s most prominent film and TV writer-directors Lucia Puenzo.
Sticking with a talent alliance that worked so well for Fabula and Fremantle the first time around, Puenzo also co-wrote and is directing “Señorita 89.” She is joined by co-screenwriters María Renée Prudencio and Tatiana Mereñuk, and co-directors Nicolás Puenzo...
- 4/29/2021
- by Jamie Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Del Toro returned after winning best director, picture at the Oscars.
The 33rd Guadalajara film festival (March 9-16) paid tribute to Guillermo del Toro, back in Mexico after winning the best director and best film Oscars for The Shape Of Water.
The filmmaker, met with standing ovations during the festival, took part in three master classes attended by around 12,000 people and launched three scholarships. During the event he revealed plans to shoot a film in Mexico.
Del Toro also opened a new cinema named after him, one of nine new state of the art venues with a 3500-seat capacity in...
The 33rd Guadalajara film festival (March 9-16) paid tribute to Guillermo del Toro, back in Mexico after winning the best director and best film Oscars for The Shape Of Water.
The filmmaker, met with standing ovations during the festival, took part in three master classes attended by around 12,000 people and launched three scholarships. During the event he revealed plans to shoot a film in Mexico.
Del Toro also opened a new cinema named after him, one of nine new state of the art venues with a 3500-seat capacity in...
- 3/19/2018
- by Alexis Grivas
- ScreenDaily
As the star-studded Cannes 70th anniversary gala dinner wrapped up on May 23, a mariachi band came out to play “Cielito lindo,” “México lindo y querido,” and the Spanish version of “Happy Birthday” turning this year’s Cannes Film Festival into a celebration of #MexiCannes.2017 Cannes.. Photograph by Justin Bishop. Salma Hayek wears Yves Saint Laurent and a Boucheron necklace. Francois-Henri Pinault wears Gucci.Read more in Remezcla here. In a few red-tinted videos, Salma Hayek, Guillermo del Toro, Emmanuel Lubezki, Alfonso Cuarón, Alejandro G. Iñárritu, and BFFs Diego Luna and Gael García Bernal can be seen gathering around Table 46 to sing along with the mariachis. They also attracted other celebrities like Isabelle Huppert and quickly became the center of attention. As they loudly sang, a larger group surrounded them and recorded them on their phones. And with GdT giving the performance of a lifetime, it’s hard to blame onlookers.
- 6/5/2017
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Director Patricio Guzman’s Cordillera among winners in industry strands.
The 32nd Guadalajara Film Festival (March 10-17), bookended by fierce criticism of Us president Donald Trump by local and international industry, has feted Everardo Gonzalez’s documentary Devil’s Freedom (La Libertad Del Diablo) with best Mexican feature, best Ibero-American documentary and best cinematography as well as the Mexican film critics trophy.
The feature, about violence in Mexico, is handled by Films Boutique and received its world premiere in Berlin earlier this year where it won an Amnesty International award.
Carlos Lechuga’s Santa And Andres, about political dissent in Cuba, was named best Ibero-American feature and also won best script.
Nicaraguan director Jose Maria Cabral’s prison drama Carpinteros (Woodpeckers) won best Ibero-American director in addition to best actor for Jean Jean.
Mexican debutant Sofia Gomez’s The Blue Years (Los Anios Azules), a coming of age drama, garnered five awards including best director, the Fipresci...
The 32nd Guadalajara Film Festival (March 10-17), bookended by fierce criticism of Us president Donald Trump by local and international industry, has feted Everardo Gonzalez’s documentary Devil’s Freedom (La Libertad Del Diablo) with best Mexican feature, best Ibero-American documentary and best cinematography as well as the Mexican film critics trophy.
The feature, about violence in Mexico, is handled by Films Boutique and received its world premiere in Berlin earlier this year where it won an Amnesty International award.
Carlos Lechuga’s Santa And Andres, about political dissent in Cuba, was named best Ibero-American feature and also won best script.
Nicaraguan director Jose Maria Cabral’s prison drama Carpinteros (Woodpeckers) won best Ibero-American director in addition to best actor for Jean Jean.
Mexican debutant Sofia Gomez’s The Blue Years (Los Anios Azules), a coming of age drama, garnered five awards including best director, the Fipresci...
- 3/17/2017
- by alexisgrivas@yahoo.com (Alexis Grivas)
- ScreenDaily
This year at the 30th Guadalajara Film Festival (FICG30), the selection of projects in the 11th Coproduction Meeting was especially strong. With a broad mix of festival and “popular” type films, the jury chose the very films I would have chosen myself.
The Market focuses on writers and only chooses those with the strongest scripts. Prizes honor the best proposals and act to connect the producers with those who will become strong future collaborators. Among 295 projects submitted, 28 were selected. The selection is intended to give a new vision to the Latin American film scene.
Five out of the six winners are projects to be directed by women. Two are Cuban. Four others are Mexican, Colombian, Argentinean. And the winners are:
1. Meet Prize: Paid trip and entry to Meets, the Latin American Film Market of the International Film Festival de Panamá includes entry into the competition for Us$95,000 in cash
Winner: “1989," Directors: Sebastián and Rodrigo Barriuso (Canada, Cuba).
A standout project, even a possible future winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Rodrigo and Sebastian Barriuso’s “ 1989" won a paid trip and entry to Meets, the Latin American Film Market of the International Film Festival de Panamá whose competition for Us$95,000 in cash will be at stake.
Based on true events, the story is set three years after the nuclear explosion in Chernobyl, when the first patients to receive medical treatment for cancer arrived in Havana Cuba. Totally unprepared, forced to leave his family to do a job he is untrained to do, he finds storytelling a salvation when a child tells him the story of Chernobyl from his child’s point of view.
This character driven story of a father, forced to become a translator for the sick children and their mothers in hospitals throughout Havana tells how he copes with the separation from his family at the very time that the Russians have withdrawn all aid, the fall of the Berlin Wall and Cuba’s economic collapse, represents the sort of films the brothers Barriuso want to make about under-represented social issues.
The two Cuban-Canadian Barriuso brothers reside in Canada, a great place for coproductions as it has the most coproduction treaties in the world. They look like twins but are three years apart as are the two little boys (one year old and four years old) in their projected film whose father is suddenly torn from his academic post as a professor of Russian literature and told by the Cuban government to work nightshifts in the cancer ward of the victims of the Chernobyl (Ukraine) accident (which will be commemorating the 30th anniversary in 2016).
Rodrigo is art-oriented, curating a show of Cuban artists in Toronto while his brother is business-educated. Their work has premiered and screened at prestigious festivals like Berlinale, Tiff, Miami, Slamdance and Marrakesh. Their work has a strong social and existential appeal and is strongly influence by the art world. This project was developed at Norman Jewison’s Canadian Center and then at the Tiff Studio, programmed by Hayet Benkara. It has already received a quarter of the budget in funds and the brothers are beginning to speak with international sales agents.
2. Churubusco Prize (Mexico’s oldest studio, Churbusco gives Us$100,000 in post-production services.
Winner: “Restos de Viento” (“Wind Traces”), Director: Jimena Montemayor (México). ♀
A family tries to recover after the sudden death of the father. The mother, a victim of depression, is incapable of accepting the loss and tells her children that their father will return. For her seven-year-old son this means a cadaver will return to fulfill the role of his father. The eleven year old daughter experiences a profound rejection of adult life. The two children accompany each other as they try to understand and process what death has brought into their lives.
“Wind Traces” explores the collision of two worlds through death. A child and an adult’s perspective on death shape the portrait of a family that is recovering after a loss.
"Wind Traces" is a coproduction between Mexican production companies Varios Lobos Producciones, with 14% of investment, and Conejo Media with 6%. So far it is a 100% Mexican film, but the filmmakers are looking to find a coproduction partner from other countries, especially from Latin America.
In early 2014, development stage began between the two production houses. In July 2014 the project participated in the International Pitching Market of the Guanajuato International Film Festival where it won the Lci Award, which covers the film insurance of the movie.
The filmmakers are seeking other funds and workshops that allow them to continue developing the project and refine the script. Among those they will apply to are the BaqLab, at the Barranquilla Film Festival and Meets at the Panama Film Festival.
The final funding will be through the Fiscal Stimulus Eficine 189.
Director Jimena Montemayor says that, “with ‘Wind Traces’ I would like to explore the stages of grief as well as the thoughts on a loss that will not go away because it leaves us with an emptiness that in time we learn to inhabit, both physically and emotionally.
I am interested in narrating this process from the child’s perspective. We were all children once, but we tend to forget as we grow older that the world can be an incomprehensible place when we try to communicate with it. Maybe that’s why we are unaware of how children deal with loss.
Their resilience and their ability to overcome adverse situations during childhood [includes] Death as something that they take with them]. The absence of that person lingers like a shadow until you overcome the loss. That is how Daniel, the seven year old, materializes his grief, in the company of a dead man in the house; a man he fears at first but that gradually becomes a companion that finally fulfills his destiny: to part from his father.
Death is also an injection of life, an unparalleled chance to approach it with a much greater understanding and fulfillment. People will empathize and be touched by this story, and not just those who have suffered a loss.
Whoever remembers those formative years knows that there are moments where nostalgia overcomes us; we remember certain scars and despite the fact they can never be erased we will forget them little by little as we head into adulthood, leaving their importance buried in our subconscious.
In ‘Wind Traces’ each character deals with death in the same way they experience life.”
3. New Art Digital Prize (Complete postproduction for a value of Us$ 43,000)
Winner: “Estática Milagrosa” (“Static Miracle”), Directors: Noelia Lacayo ♀ and Gustavo Vinagre Alves (Cuba).
The second Cuban film to win and the second winning film to be directed by a woman deals with the “miracle” in Cuba of houses still standing, propped up by scaffolding and about to collapse while still inhabited with multiple families. Their beauty and their sad shape are analogous to the lives of many people in Cuba as well. “Static Miracle” is the official term for all buildings in danger of collapsing
This film deals with the people whose “static miracle” is that they continue their lives in the midst of imminent disintegration. Eight year old Marion has a collage of Fidel Castro on his bedroom wall but the images deteriorate with the humidity of every rainfall. Seventy-six year old Patria treis to maintina the rules of her aristocratic past, but her mansion is now a hostel for tourists. Eighteen year old Yuri prepares to shoot the video clip that will launch him into stardom but he has not left his room in two years. Twenty-nine year old Nicolas, a foreigner without visa or money, films houses in Havana that move as they resist the passage of time.
4. Equipment & Film Design Prize (Efd) (A package of 7 days of filming with a value of Us$ 23,000).
Winner: “Cuando se silencien los fusiles” (“When the Guns are Silenced”), Director: Nathalia Isabel Orozco Rojas (Colombia). ♀
This documentary will shoot in Havana and Colombia as it concerns the current ongoing negotiations of Farc, the Revolutionary Armed Force of Colombia and the government of Colombia which are taking place now in Havana. After half a century of armed struggle, Farc, the oldest guerilla force in the world, is preparing to silence its weapons. This doc follows Farc’s military strategist and commander, Pablo Catatumbo, who has been part of the war for 40 years. His story and the complex relations with other commanders and rebels reveal the difficulties and challenges for the fighters in their final battle: the transition to democracy.
The Colombian filmmaker and independent news correspondent, Nathalia Isabel Orozco Rojas has won the Cpb Journalism Award 2014 for Best TV interview in 2013 and twice has won the Simon Bolivar National Journalism Award (in 2011 and 2010). Natalia has a B.A. in journalism, a Masters in political science and a Masters in international cooperation from the Sorbonne.
5. Lci Seguros Prize (Discounted Insurance of 50% up to Us$ 50 million).
Winner: “Julia Privada” (“Intimate Julia”), Directors: Karina Mirujin y Mariana Fonseca (Argentina). ♀
This Argentine fiction feature takes place in Buenos Aires in 1989. During the grave economic crisis of the time, the young woman Julia cleans and interfaces with the public for a reclusive boss. The comfort of silence between them from the first day makes her feel good although it is rather odd and mysterious. She is permitted full liberty except for entering his bedroom and writing studio. Curiosity about that makes this apartment, where she originally sought shelter and security, a possible cage.
Honorable Mention: (Support by Churubusco Studios of Equipment & Film Design, New Art Digital y Lci insurance).
Winner: “Donde se quedan las cosas” (“Where Things Remain”), Director: Daniela Silva Solórzano (México). ♀
This documentary is about Federico Solorzano, a paleontologist born in Guadalajara, Mexico. After a lifetime of collecting fossils, teaching and researching, opens the only science museum in the state of Jalisco. He shares his fossil collection, the largest in the country along with his memories through the eyes of his dranddaughter who goes through the more than 50 collections he has kept in perfect condition which creates a collective past of a city, a time period and a generation of more than 70 years.
Director Daniela Silva, born in Guadalajara, Jalisco is the granddaughter of the sculptor Federico Silva and niece of the famous cartoonist Jis. Twenty-two years of age, she has already produced “The Cloud Factory” last year and directed “Good Night, Lucy”.
The winners were selected by the following jury members:
Maru Farías (Director of New Projects at Equipment& Film Design with over 15 years working in the film industry). ♀
Javier Beltramino (Production Manager at Telefónica Studios in Argentina).
Bosco Arochi C. (Technical and Production Director at Estudios Churubusco S. A.).
Raymundo Osorio García (General Director at New Art Digital with 27 years work in publicity, television, and film in Mexico)
José Antonio Asencio (Adviser at Lci Seguros, producer, and Director of Photography of 150 documentaries, shorts, as well as 30 features).
The Market focuses on writers and only chooses those with the strongest scripts. Prizes honor the best proposals and act to connect the producers with those who will become strong future collaborators. Among 295 projects submitted, 28 were selected. The selection is intended to give a new vision to the Latin American film scene.
Five out of the six winners are projects to be directed by women. Two are Cuban. Four others are Mexican, Colombian, Argentinean. And the winners are:
1. Meet Prize: Paid trip and entry to Meets, the Latin American Film Market of the International Film Festival de Panamá includes entry into the competition for Us$95,000 in cash
Winner: “1989," Directors: Sebastián and Rodrigo Barriuso (Canada, Cuba).
A standout project, even a possible future winner of the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film, Rodrigo and Sebastian Barriuso’s “ 1989" won a paid trip and entry to Meets, the Latin American Film Market of the International Film Festival de Panamá whose competition for Us$95,000 in cash will be at stake.
Based on true events, the story is set three years after the nuclear explosion in Chernobyl, when the first patients to receive medical treatment for cancer arrived in Havana Cuba. Totally unprepared, forced to leave his family to do a job he is untrained to do, he finds storytelling a salvation when a child tells him the story of Chernobyl from his child’s point of view.
This character driven story of a father, forced to become a translator for the sick children and their mothers in hospitals throughout Havana tells how he copes with the separation from his family at the very time that the Russians have withdrawn all aid, the fall of the Berlin Wall and Cuba’s economic collapse, represents the sort of films the brothers Barriuso want to make about under-represented social issues.
The two Cuban-Canadian Barriuso brothers reside in Canada, a great place for coproductions as it has the most coproduction treaties in the world. They look like twins but are three years apart as are the two little boys (one year old and four years old) in their projected film whose father is suddenly torn from his academic post as a professor of Russian literature and told by the Cuban government to work nightshifts in the cancer ward of the victims of the Chernobyl (Ukraine) accident (which will be commemorating the 30th anniversary in 2016).
Rodrigo is art-oriented, curating a show of Cuban artists in Toronto while his brother is business-educated. Their work has premiered and screened at prestigious festivals like Berlinale, Tiff, Miami, Slamdance and Marrakesh. Their work has a strong social and existential appeal and is strongly influence by the art world. This project was developed at Norman Jewison’s Canadian Center and then at the Tiff Studio, programmed by Hayet Benkara. It has already received a quarter of the budget in funds and the brothers are beginning to speak with international sales agents.
2. Churubusco Prize (Mexico’s oldest studio, Churbusco gives Us$100,000 in post-production services.
Winner: “Restos de Viento” (“Wind Traces”), Director: Jimena Montemayor (México). ♀
A family tries to recover after the sudden death of the father. The mother, a victim of depression, is incapable of accepting the loss and tells her children that their father will return. For her seven-year-old son this means a cadaver will return to fulfill the role of his father. The eleven year old daughter experiences a profound rejection of adult life. The two children accompany each other as they try to understand and process what death has brought into their lives.
“Wind Traces” explores the collision of two worlds through death. A child and an adult’s perspective on death shape the portrait of a family that is recovering after a loss.
"Wind Traces" is a coproduction between Mexican production companies Varios Lobos Producciones, with 14% of investment, and Conejo Media with 6%. So far it is a 100% Mexican film, but the filmmakers are looking to find a coproduction partner from other countries, especially from Latin America.
In early 2014, development stage began between the two production houses. In July 2014 the project participated in the International Pitching Market of the Guanajuato International Film Festival where it won the Lci Award, which covers the film insurance of the movie.
The filmmakers are seeking other funds and workshops that allow them to continue developing the project and refine the script. Among those they will apply to are the BaqLab, at the Barranquilla Film Festival and Meets at the Panama Film Festival.
The final funding will be through the Fiscal Stimulus Eficine 189.
Director Jimena Montemayor says that, “with ‘Wind Traces’ I would like to explore the stages of grief as well as the thoughts on a loss that will not go away because it leaves us with an emptiness that in time we learn to inhabit, both physically and emotionally.
I am interested in narrating this process from the child’s perspective. We were all children once, but we tend to forget as we grow older that the world can be an incomprehensible place when we try to communicate with it. Maybe that’s why we are unaware of how children deal with loss.
Their resilience and their ability to overcome adverse situations during childhood [includes] Death as something that they take with them]. The absence of that person lingers like a shadow until you overcome the loss. That is how Daniel, the seven year old, materializes his grief, in the company of a dead man in the house; a man he fears at first but that gradually becomes a companion that finally fulfills his destiny: to part from his father.
Death is also an injection of life, an unparalleled chance to approach it with a much greater understanding and fulfillment. People will empathize and be touched by this story, and not just those who have suffered a loss.
Whoever remembers those formative years knows that there are moments where nostalgia overcomes us; we remember certain scars and despite the fact they can never be erased we will forget them little by little as we head into adulthood, leaving their importance buried in our subconscious.
In ‘Wind Traces’ each character deals with death in the same way they experience life.”
3. New Art Digital Prize (Complete postproduction for a value of Us$ 43,000)
Winner: “Estática Milagrosa” (“Static Miracle”), Directors: Noelia Lacayo ♀ and Gustavo Vinagre Alves (Cuba).
The second Cuban film to win and the second winning film to be directed by a woman deals with the “miracle” in Cuba of houses still standing, propped up by scaffolding and about to collapse while still inhabited with multiple families. Their beauty and their sad shape are analogous to the lives of many people in Cuba as well. “Static Miracle” is the official term for all buildings in danger of collapsing
This film deals with the people whose “static miracle” is that they continue their lives in the midst of imminent disintegration. Eight year old Marion has a collage of Fidel Castro on his bedroom wall but the images deteriorate with the humidity of every rainfall. Seventy-six year old Patria treis to maintina the rules of her aristocratic past, but her mansion is now a hostel for tourists. Eighteen year old Yuri prepares to shoot the video clip that will launch him into stardom but he has not left his room in two years. Twenty-nine year old Nicolas, a foreigner without visa or money, films houses in Havana that move as they resist the passage of time.
4. Equipment & Film Design Prize (Efd) (A package of 7 days of filming with a value of Us$ 23,000).
Winner: “Cuando se silencien los fusiles” (“When the Guns are Silenced”), Director: Nathalia Isabel Orozco Rojas (Colombia). ♀
This documentary will shoot in Havana and Colombia as it concerns the current ongoing negotiations of Farc, the Revolutionary Armed Force of Colombia and the government of Colombia which are taking place now in Havana. After half a century of armed struggle, Farc, the oldest guerilla force in the world, is preparing to silence its weapons. This doc follows Farc’s military strategist and commander, Pablo Catatumbo, who has been part of the war for 40 years. His story and the complex relations with other commanders and rebels reveal the difficulties and challenges for the fighters in their final battle: the transition to democracy.
The Colombian filmmaker and independent news correspondent, Nathalia Isabel Orozco Rojas has won the Cpb Journalism Award 2014 for Best TV interview in 2013 and twice has won the Simon Bolivar National Journalism Award (in 2011 and 2010). Natalia has a B.A. in journalism, a Masters in political science and a Masters in international cooperation from the Sorbonne.
5. Lci Seguros Prize (Discounted Insurance of 50% up to Us$ 50 million).
Winner: “Julia Privada” (“Intimate Julia”), Directors: Karina Mirujin y Mariana Fonseca (Argentina). ♀
This Argentine fiction feature takes place in Buenos Aires in 1989. During the grave economic crisis of the time, the young woman Julia cleans and interfaces with the public for a reclusive boss. The comfort of silence between them from the first day makes her feel good although it is rather odd and mysterious. She is permitted full liberty except for entering his bedroom and writing studio. Curiosity about that makes this apartment, where she originally sought shelter and security, a possible cage.
Honorable Mention: (Support by Churubusco Studios of Equipment & Film Design, New Art Digital y Lci insurance).
Winner: “Donde se quedan las cosas” (“Where Things Remain”), Director: Daniela Silva Solórzano (México). ♀
This documentary is about Federico Solorzano, a paleontologist born in Guadalajara, Mexico. After a lifetime of collecting fossils, teaching and researching, opens the only science museum in the state of Jalisco. He shares his fossil collection, the largest in the country along with his memories through the eyes of his dranddaughter who goes through the more than 50 collections he has kept in perfect condition which creates a collective past of a city, a time period and a generation of more than 70 years.
Director Daniela Silva, born in Guadalajara, Jalisco is the granddaughter of the sculptor Federico Silva and niece of the famous cartoonist Jis. Twenty-two years of age, she has already produced “The Cloud Factory” last year and directed “Good Night, Lucy”.
The winners were selected by the following jury members:
Maru Farías (Director of New Projects at Equipment& Film Design with over 15 years working in the film industry). ♀
Javier Beltramino (Production Manager at Telefónica Studios in Argentina).
Bosco Arochi C. (Technical and Production Director at Estudios Churubusco S. A.).
Raymundo Osorio García (General Director at New Art Digital with 27 years work in publicity, television, and film in Mexico)
José Antonio Asencio (Adviser at Lci Seguros, producer, and Director of Photography of 150 documentaries, shorts, as well as 30 features).
- 3/26/2015
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
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