Projects selected from across South America and Europe.
Scroll down for full list of projects
San Sebastian’s Europe-Latin America Co-production Forum (Sept 21-23) has revealed the 15 projects selected from 173 submissions.
The majority of titles, spanning 17 countries, have yet to be seen at international co-production gatherings
Furthermore, in the framework of the Festival’s collaboration with the Ibermedia Programme, one project, selected at the Workshop to develop film projects from Central America and the Caribbean, will participate in the Co-production Forum, not in competition - Patricia Ramos’s El sueco.
The final selection includes projects by established directors such as Nicolás Rincón and Israel Adrián Caetano alongside emerging filmmakers such as including Larissa Figueiredo and Théo Court.
Projects presented at previous editions of the Forum have been selected for a major festivals including Carlos Moreno’s Que Viva la Música!, which played at Sundance in January; David Pablos’s Las Elegidas, which screened...
Scroll down for full list of projects
San Sebastian’s Europe-Latin America Co-production Forum (Sept 21-23) has revealed the 15 projects selected from 173 submissions.
The majority of titles, spanning 17 countries, have yet to be seen at international co-production gatherings
Furthermore, in the framework of the Festival’s collaboration with the Ibermedia Programme, one project, selected at the Workshop to develop film projects from Central America and the Caribbean, will participate in the Co-production Forum, not in competition - Patricia Ramos’s El sueco.
The final selection includes projects by established directors such as Nicolás Rincón and Israel Adrián Caetano alongside emerging filmmakers such as including Larissa Figueiredo and Théo Court.
Projects presented at previous editions of the Forum have been selected for a major festivals including Carlos Moreno’s Que Viva la Música!, which played at Sundance in January; David Pablos’s Las Elegidas, which screened...
- 8/6/2015
- ScreenDaily
What will the next year's festivals be showing? Look at what the Hubert Bals Fund of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr) has selected for a preview: nineteen film projects will receive grants for script development, digital production, postproduction or workshops. In its Spring 2012 selection round, the Fund gives 260,000 Euro to projects from fifteen Asian, African and Latin-American and Eastern European countries. (See full list below)
In this selection round, the Fund welcomes promising first or second time feature film projects by Song Fang, Huang Ji (both China), Gurvinder Singh (India), Caroline Kamya (Uganda), Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia), Sebastian Hofmann (Mexico) and Eduardo Nunes (Brazil).
Supporting more experienced filmmakers, the Fund has selected projects from, among others, Pablo Stoll (Uruguay), Aditya Assarat (Thailand) and Tariq Teguia (Algeria).
The selection round also awards 5,000 Euro prize money for the Hubert Bals Fund Award, to be handed out to the most promising fiction project at the upcoming Durban FilmMart (20-23 July 2012), and a grant for the next Colón Workshop for Latin American filmmakers, partner organization of the Rotterdam Lab.
Postproduction
When finished in time, the films receiving Hbf postproduction grants are expected to screen at the 2013 International Film Festival Rotterdam.
After her short film 'Goodbye' (2009, awarded at Cannes’ Cinefondation), Chinese filmmaker Song Fang makes her feature debut with 'Memories Look At Me', a strikingly observed portrait of her Chinese family life.
DoP or editor of films by among others Fernando Eimbcke, Carlos Reygadas and Gerardo Tort, Sebastian Hoffman (Mexico) writes and directs his first feature film 'Halley', a contemporary gothic story that casts a compassionate look at the life of a zombie.
After 'Rome Rather Than You' (which premiered 2006 in Venice) and 'Inland', Tariq Teguia (Algeria) is working on his third feature film, 'Ibn Battuta' which follows a journalist on his investigative journey throughout North Africa and the Middle East. The project previously received a script development grant from the Hubert Bals Fund.
Digital production
This round, digital production support goes to acclaimed filmmakers Yang Heng (China) and Riri Riza (Indonesia). Yang’s previous works are 'Betelnut' (New Currents Award in Busan and Hivos Tiger Award competitor in 2010) and 'Sun Spots' (also supported by the Hubert Bals Fund). In his 'Lake August' he continues to portrait young adults’ life in his home province. Experienced film maker, producer and writer Riza ('Eliana, Eliana' 2002) situates his new film 'Atambua 39° Celsius' among a family separated from their relatives following the independence of the state of Eastern Timor in 2002.
Script development
The ten grants for script development support both upcoming and experienced filmmakers. Huang Ji (China) works on 'Foolish Bird', the second installment of the trilogy she started with her feature debut and Hivos Tiger Award-winning 'Egg and Stone'.
Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia) writes his first feature film, 'The Load'. Set in Serbia during the Nato bombings in 1999, the film follows the driver of a freeze truck. He does not want to know what the load is, but the cargo slowly becomes his burden.
Alex Piperno (Mexico) prepares his first feature project 'Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine', in which a ship crew member discovers a solitary girl behind a mysterious door.
Caroline Kamya (Uganda) works on her second feature film, 'Hot Comb' in which two school girls from different backgrounds become close. Her debut feature 'Imani' premiered in Berlin.
Furthermore, the Fund supports the script development of new projects by two experienced filmmakers: Pablo Stoll (Uruguay) whose ‘3’ was launched at CineMart and received its premiere this year in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, writes and produces his next project 'Silver Shadow'; Aditya Assarat (Thailand), Hivos Tiger Award winner for 'Wonderful Town', prepares 'The White Buffalo' also presented at this year’s CineMart.
The line up of the Iffr’s Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 Selection Round in full:
Post-production funding or final-financing
Halley; Sebastian Hofmann; Mexico
Ibn Battuta; Tariq Teguia; Algeria
Peculiar Vacation and Other Illnesses; Yosep Anggi Noen; Indonesia
Poor Folk; Midi Z; Myanmar
Memories Look At Me; Song Fang; China
Digital production
Atambua 39° Celcius; Riri Riza; Indonesia
Lake August; Yang Heng; China
Script and projectdevelopment
Foolish Bird; Huang Ji; China
The Fourth Direction; Gurvinder Singh; India
A Happy Death; Eduardo Nunes; Brazil
Hot Comb; Caroline Kamya; Uganda
Leave It For Tomorrow, For Night Has Fallen; Jet Leyco; Philippines
The Load; Ognjen Glavonic; Serbia
The Sigbin Chronicles; Joanna Vasquez Arong; Philippines
Silver Shadow; Pablo Stoll; Uruguay
The White Buffalo; Aditya Assarat; Thailand
Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine; Alex Piperno; Uruguay
Workshops
Durban FilmMart; South Africa, Hubert Bals Fund Award
Xiii Colón Workshop for Latin American Filmmakers; Argentina
Profile of the Hubert Bals Fund
The Hubert Bals Fund (Hbf), along with the CineMart, is part of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr). The 42nd Iffr will take place January 23 – February 3, 2013. Year-round news on Iffr, Hbf and CineMart can be found onwww.filmfestivalrotterdam.com.
The Hubert Bals Fund is designed to bring remarkable or urgent feature films and feature-length creative documentaries by innovative and talented filmmakers from developing countries closer to completion. The Hubert Bals Fund provides grants that often turn out to play a crucial role in enabling these filmmakers to realize their projects. Although the Fund looks closely at the financial aspects of a project, the decisive factors remain its content and artistic value. Since the Fund started in 1989, hundreds of projects from independent filmmakers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and parts of Eastern Europe have received support. Approximately 80% of these projects have been realized or are currently in production. Every year, the Iffr screens completed films supported by the Fund.
The Hubert Bals Fund is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Media Mundus, Dutch non-governmental development organization Hivos Culture Foundation, the Doen Foundation and the Dioraphte Foundation and Lions Club Rotterdam: L’Esprit du Temps.
Grants and selection rounds
Annually, the Hubert Bals Fund is able to make individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops. Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Hubert Bals Fund-supported films in Iffr and on DVD/VOD
Most of the films supported by the Hubert Bals Fund throughout the year are screened during the International Film Festival Rotterdam in attendance of the filmmaker. Subsequently, part of the Hbf-supported films is released by the Iffr on DVD or VOD, available on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/webshop (VOD for viewers in the Benelux only).
In this selection round, the Fund welcomes promising first or second time feature film projects by Song Fang, Huang Ji (both China), Gurvinder Singh (India), Caroline Kamya (Uganda), Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia), Sebastian Hofmann (Mexico) and Eduardo Nunes (Brazil).
Supporting more experienced filmmakers, the Fund has selected projects from, among others, Pablo Stoll (Uruguay), Aditya Assarat (Thailand) and Tariq Teguia (Algeria).
The selection round also awards 5,000 Euro prize money for the Hubert Bals Fund Award, to be handed out to the most promising fiction project at the upcoming Durban FilmMart (20-23 July 2012), and a grant for the next Colón Workshop for Latin American filmmakers, partner organization of the Rotterdam Lab.
Postproduction
When finished in time, the films receiving Hbf postproduction grants are expected to screen at the 2013 International Film Festival Rotterdam.
After her short film 'Goodbye' (2009, awarded at Cannes’ Cinefondation), Chinese filmmaker Song Fang makes her feature debut with 'Memories Look At Me', a strikingly observed portrait of her Chinese family life.
DoP or editor of films by among others Fernando Eimbcke, Carlos Reygadas and Gerardo Tort, Sebastian Hoffman (Mexico) writes and directs his first feature film 'Halley', a contemporary gothic story that casts a compassionate look at the life of a zombie.
After 'Rome Rather Than You' (which premiered 2006 in Venice) and 'Inland', Tariq Teguia (Algeria) is working on his third feature film, 'Ibn Battuta' which follows a journalist on his investigative journey throughout North Africa and the Middle East. The project previously received a script development grant from the Hubert Bals Fund.
Digital production
This round, digital production support goes to acclaimed filmmakers Yang Heng (China) and Riri Riza (Indonesia). Yang’s previous works are 'Betelnut' (New Currents Award in Busan and Hivos Tiger Award competitor in 2010) and 'Sun Spots' (also supported by the Hubert Bals Fund). In his 'Lake August' he continues to portrait young adults’ life in his home province. Experienced film maker, producer and writer Riza ('Eliana, Eliana' 2002) situates his new film 'Atambua 39° Celsius' among a family separated from their relatives following the independence of the state of Eastern Timor in 2002.
Script development
The ten grants for script development support both upcoming and experienced filmmakers. Huang Ji (China) works on 'Foolish Bird', the second installment of the trilogy she started with her feature debut and Hivos Tiger Award-winning 'Egg and Stone'.
Ognjen Glavonic (Serbia) writes his first feature film, 'The Load'. Set in Serbia during the Nato bombings in 1999, the film follows the driver of a freeze truck. He does not want to know what the load is, but the cargo slowly becomes his burden.
Alex Piperno (Mexico) prepares his first feature project 'Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine', in which a ship crew member discovers a solitary girl behind a mysterious door.
Caroline Kamya (Uganda) works on her second feature film, 'Hot Comb' in which two school girls from different backgrounds become close. Her debut feature 'Imani' premiered in Berlin.
Furthermore, the Fund supports the script development of new projects by two experienced filmmakers: Pablo Stoll (Uruguay) whose ‘3’ was launched at CineMart and received its premiere this year in Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight, writes and produces his next project 'Silver Shadow'; Aditya Assarat (Thailand), Hivos Tiger Award winner for 'Wonderful Town', prepares 'The White Buffalo' also presented at this year’s CineMart.
The line up of the Iffr’s Hubert Bals Fund Spring 2012 Selection Round in full:
Post-production funding or final-financing
Halley; Sebastian Hofmann; Mexico
Ibn Battuta; Tariq Teguia; Algeria
Peculiar Vacation and Other Illnesses; Yosep Anggi Noen; Indonesia
Poor Folk; Midi Z; Myanmar
Memories Look At Me; Song Fang; China
Digital production
Atambua 39° Celcius; Riri Riza; Indonesia
Lake August; Yang Heng; China
Script and projectdevelopment
Foolish Bird; Huang Ji; China
The Fourth Direction; Gurvinder Singh; India
A Happy Death; Eduardo Nunes; Brazil
Hot Comb; Caroline Kamya; Uganda
Leave It For Tomorrow, For Night Has Fallen; Jet Leyco; Philippines
The Load; Ognjen Glavonic; Serbia
The Sigbin Chronicles; Joanna Vasquez Arong; Philippines
Silver Shadow; Pablo Stoll; Uruguay
The White Buffalo; Aditya Assarat; Thailand
Window Boy Would Also Like to Have a Submarine; Alex Piperno; Uruguay
Workshops
Durban FilmMart; South Africa, Hubert Bals Fund Award
Xiii Colón Workshop for Latin American Filmmakers; Argentina
Profile of the Hubert Bals Fund
The Hubert Bals Fund (Hbf), along with the CineMart, is part of the International Film Festival Rotterdam (Iffr). The 42nd Iffr will take place January 23 – February 3, 2013. Year-round news on Iffr, Hbf and CineMart can be found onwww.filmfestivalrotterdam.com.
The Hubert Bals Fund is designed to bring remarkable or urgent feature films and feature-length creative documentaries by innovative and talented filmmakers from developing countries closer to completion. The Hubert Bals Fund provides grants that often turn out to play a crucial role in enabling these filmmakers to realize their projects. Although the Fund looks closely at the financial aspects of a project, the decisive factors remain its content and artistic value. Since the Fund started in 1989, hundreds of projects from independent filmmakers in Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and parts of Eastern Europe have received support. Approximately 80% of these projects have been realized or are currently in production. Every year, the Iffr screens completed films supported by the Fund.
The Hubert Bals Fund is supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Media Mundus, Dutch non-governmental development organization Hivos Culture Foundation, the Doen Foundation and the Dioraphte Foundation and Lions Club Rotterdam: L’Esprit du Temps.
Grants and selection rounds
Annually, the Hubert Bals Fund is able to make individual grants of up to Euro 10,000 for script and project development, Euro 20,000 for digital production, Euro 30,000 for post-production, Euro 15,000 towards distribution costs in the country of origin or Euro 10,000 for special projects such as workshops. Selection rounds take place twice a year and have application deadlines on March 1 and August 1.
Hubert Bals Fund-supported films in Iffr and on DVD/VOD
Most of the films supported by the Hubert Bals Fund throughout the year are screened during the International Film Festival Rotterdam in attendance of the filmmaker. Subsequently, part of the Hbf-supported films is released by the Iffr on DVD or VOD, available on www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/webshop (VOD for viewers in the Benelux only).
- 7/9/2012
- by Sydney Levine
- Sydney's Buzz
Oscar's foreign film submission announcements will be flying at us for the next month and you can keep track of the whole list at my foreign oscar predictions pages. A short time ago I told you that South Korea had narrowed down their Oscar submissions. That news was shortlived as the competition is over and they've gone with the battlefield drama The Front Line. [Thanks to faithful Tfe reader Jin for the info.]
Here's the warry trailer.
Excuse me but I barely see any actressing! I mean other than Kim Ok-bin. Shouldn't there be a rule against films light on actressing in South Korean cinema? They have so many good ones and their one representative film for AMPAS is practically bereft of them? sigh.
To make up for their sudden xy departure, here's a recent photoshoot starring Kim Ok-bin, who you'll recall was a Film Bitch nominee right here in 2009 for Thirst.
I feel much better already...
Three other selections were announced last week.
Here's the warry trailer.
Excuse me but I barely see any actressing! I mean other than Kim Ok-bin. Shouldn't there be a rule against films light on actressing in South Korean cinema? They have so many good ones and their one representative film for AMPAS is practically bereft of them? sigh.
To make up for their sudden xy departure, here's a recent photoshoot starring Kim Ok-bin, who you'll recall was a Film Bitch nominee right here in 2009 for Thirst.
I feel much better already...
Three other selections were announced last week.
- 8/31/2011
- by NATHANIEL R
- FilmExperience
The 17th annual San Antonio Film Festival is back with their 17th annual edition, which will run on June 16-26 at several locations around the city. Once again, the fest is a truly international affair with a special emphasis on films produced south of the border.
The feature films and shorts this year come from as far away as Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Madrid and London, but there are also numerous films from Central and South America, including two features from Mexico: Gerardo Tort’s Viaje Redondo; and Roberto Hernández & Geoffrey Smith’s Presunto Culpable.
There are also lots of regionally-made films, including two special programs featuring short films by local high school students, co-presented with Klrn public television.
Plus, once again, the fest is chock full of documentaries, from sports docs like Robert Herrera’s The Gray Seasons, to activist docs like Jon Cooksey’s How to Boil a Frog,...
The feature films and shorts this year come from as far away as Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Madrid and London, but there are also numerous films from Central and South America, including two features from Mexico: Gerardo Tort’s Viaje Redondo; and Roberto Hernández & Geoffrey Smith’s Presunto Culpable.
There are also lots of regionally-made films, including two special programs featuring short films by local high school students, co-presented with Klrn public television.
Plus, once again, the fest is chock full of documentaries, from sports docs like Robert Herrera’s The Gray Seasons, to activist docs like Jon Cooksey’s How to Boil a Frog,...
- 6/6/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Chicago – Just two weeks after the European Union Film Festival concluded at the Gene Siskel Film Center, another excellent international showcase of world cinema began in the Windy City. The 26th Chicago Latino Film Festival screens over 120 films during its two-week run, highlighting Latino filmmakers and cultures from Latin America, Portugal, Spain and the United States.
The festival is presented by the International Latino Cultural Center, in cooperation with Columbia College Chicago, and runs from Friday, April 16th to Thursday, April 29th. It kicked off last Friday with an Opening Night Gala in the form of a Mexican fiesta, commemorating Mexico’s Bicentennial Independence and Centennial Revolution Anniversary. “Round Trip,” the winner at last year’s Guadalajara Mexican Film Festival, was screened, and its director, Gerardo Tort, was in attendance. Yet there are plenty more first-class festival events in store for moviegoers during this upcoming week.
On Friday, April 23rd,...
The festival is presented by the International Latino Cultural Center, in cooperation with Columbia College Chicago, and runs from Friday, April 16th to Thursday, April 29th. It kicked off last Friday with an Opening Night Gala in the form of a Mexican fiesta, commemorating Mexico’s Bicentennial Independence and Centennial Revolution Anniversary. “Round Trip,” the winner at last year’s Guadalajara Mexican Film Festival, was screened, and its director, Gerardo Tort, was in attendance. Yet there are plenty more first-class festival events in store for moviegoers during this upcoming week.
On Friday, April 23rd,...
- 4/23/2010
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
The 24th Guadalajara Film Festival Awards went to Gerardo Tort's Viaje Redondo (Round Trip) and Peruvian Claudia Llosa's La teta asustada (The Milk of Sorrow) in the Mexican and Latin American feature film sections, respectively. Voy a explotar (I'm Going to Explode) from Canana, directed by Gerardo Naranjo won for first work in the Latin American section, even though it was actually his second work. Naranjo's first work was Drama/Mex. Carlos Enderle's Cronicas Chilanga won for Mexican first work, Mexican screenplay, and best actor award going to Patricio Castillo. Other winners included La passion de Gabriel, Corazon del Tiempo for best director, and Retorno a Hansala also for best director. The special jury prize went to Aquele Querido Mes de Agosto (This Dear Month of August). At the Coproduction Meetings awards went to Sergio Teubal for his project El dedo and to Leandro Fabrizzi of Puerto Rico for Filiberto.
During the days of the festival, The red carpet was unfurled for the world debut of The Perfect Game by William Dear and producers David Salzberg and Christian Tureaud. Encounters with the media were held for the movies Corazón del tiempo, Niño Pez, La Última y nos Vamos, and Amor sin Fin.
Otra Película de Huevos y un Pollo by brothers Rodolfo and Gabriel Riva Palacios surprised many as the film chosen to inaugurate FLCG24.
Encounters with the media were held for the feature films Voy a Explotar, Camino which won six Goya prizes, including best movie, best director and best actress, and Rabioso Sol Rabioso Cielo.
The keynote speech Sunday March 22 under the aegis of IV Digital Space in Guadalajara will be a lecture by Peter Broderick, The New World of Distribution.
Broderick, President of Paradigm Consulting, is known as one of the leading experts in the development of creative strategies for digital distribution. His innovative viewpoints have contributed to both producers and filmmakers multiplying audiences and revenue and successfully taking advantage of the opportunities offered by the digital age.
The first day's activities included Gerardo Tort presenting his movie Viaje Redondo, director and scriptwriter Alicia Scherson and star Diego Noguera presenting the Chilean movie Turistas to the press, a competitor in the Ibero-American Feature-length Fiction category.
The Gala event featured Sólo Quiero Caminar, and afterward the Guadalajara Prize was awarded to Guadalajara's own actor, director and producer Gael Garcia Bernal. Special event Cinelandia began with Manu Chao presenting the films that have touched his life, including Los Olvidados by Luis Buñuel and Princesas by fellow Spaniard Fernando Leon de Aranoa. ...
During the days of the festival, The red carpet was unfurled for the world debut of The Perfect Game by William Dear and producers David Salzberg and Christian Tureaud. Encounters with the media were held for the movies Corazón del tiempo, Niño Pez, La Última y nos Vamos, and Amor sin Fin.
Otra Película de Huevos y un Pollo by brothers Rodolfo and Gabriel Riva Palacios surprised many as the film chosen to inaugurate FLCG24.
Encounters with the media were held for the feature films Voy a Explotar, Camino which won six Goya prizes, including best movie, best director and best actress, and Rabioso Sol Rabioso Cielo.
The keynote speech Sunday March 22 under the aegis of IV Digital Space in Guadalajara will be a lecture by Peter Broderick, The New World of Distribution.
Broderick, President of Paradigm Consulting, is known as one of the leading experts in the development of creative strategies for digital distribution. His innovative viewpoints have contributed to both producers and filmmakers multiplying audiences and revenue and successfully taking advantage of the opportunities offered by the digital age.
The first day's activities included Gerardo Tort presenting his movie Viaje Redondo, director and scriptwriter Alicia Scherson and star Diego Noguera presenting the Chilean movie Turistas to the press, a competitor in the Ibero-American Feature-length Fiction category.
The Gala event featured Sólo Quiero Caminar, and afterward the Guadalajara Prize was awarded to Guadalajara's own actor, director and producer Gael Garcia Bernal. Special event Cinelandia began with Manu Chao presenting the films that have touched his life, including Los Olvidados by Luis Buñuel and Princesas by fellow Spaniard Fernando Leon de Aranoa. ...
- 3/23/2009
- Sydney's Buzz
The award-winning Mexican movie "De la Calle" (Streeters) presents an engrossing, contemporary look at the life of teenagers and young children living on and under the streets of Mexico City. Although not a documentary, the film is able to create a gritty, realistic atmosphere. It even manages to evoke a bleak beauty and some sense of hope amid the squalor and depravity. Following a rocky production history, it could emerge as the second recent Mexican film (on the heels of the breakout hit "Y Tu Mama Tambien") to score with American audiences.
"De la Calle" follows 15-year-old Rufino and his girlfriend, Xochitl, as they try to escape from the hopeless poverty and dead-end existence of the urban sprawl of the capital for a new life in the port city of Veracruz. They dream of gazing at the sea. Rufino hears that dockyard work should be plentiful. Complicating matters is Xochitl's infant son, more or less cared for by friends. Her visits with the boy are fleeting; Xochitl spends her time living and sleeping alongside other young orphaned addicts in the sewers while occasionally picking up the menial job or two.
Rufino is a charismatic youth and natural born leader, but he is not the upstanding hero of romantic films of yore: He is a drug runner who fearlessly scams dealers and tries to outwit his connections. Rufino has incurred the wrath of the short-fused, corrupt neighborhood cop, Ochoa, who also happens to be a volatile surrogate father figure. Then the teenager is told by a grizzled street bum that his biological father (long given up for dead) may actually be living in the vicinity. The film combines the boy's search for his long-lost parent with his and his girlfriend's struggle to tie up loose ends to head to the seaside.
If all this sounds like a melodramatic concoction of Dickensian proportion, director Gerardo Tort pulls it off with style. "De la Calle" gets high marks for its admirable lack of pretense and the momentum that propels the narrative from start to finish. Marina Stavenhagen's tight script may not break new ground, but it convincingly depicts the pathetic lives of disenfranchised youth in a living hell with restraint. Occasional artistic flourishes (such as Rufino's recurring hallucinatory dreams -- shades of Bunuel's 1950 classic "Los Olvidados" -- of a Virgin Mary apparition, glimpsed amid the tenements) don't prevent the story from moving fast and furiously toward a violent, sexual and generally downbeat conclusion.
Tort, making his feature debut, has directed and co-edited with a sure sense of story. Lensing by cinematographer (and co-producer) Hector Ortega is first-rate. Luis Fernando Pena seems perfectly natural as Rufino -- brooding but impetuous, balancing the shenanigans of a boy with the maturity of a teen who has grown up much too fast. He is certainly an actor with a future.
DE LA CALLE
Tiempo y Tono Films in association with Instituto Mexicano de Cinematografia/Foprocine/Zimat Consultores
Credits:
Director: Gerardo Tort
Screenwriter: Marina Stavenhagen
Based on a play by: Jesus Gonzalez Davila
Producers: Lillian Haugen, Hector Ortega
Director of photography: Hector Ortega
Production designer: Ana Solares
Music: Diego Herrera
Editors: Carlos Hagerman, Gerardo Tort
Cast:
Rufino: Luis Fernando Pena
Xochitl: Maya Zapata
Cero: Armando Hernandez
Ochoa: Mario Zaragoza
Lencho: Jorge Zarate
Felix: Abel Woolrich
Seno: Cristina Michaus
Amparo: Vanessa Bauche
Chicharra: Luis Felipe Tovar
Running time -- 85 minutes
No MPAA rating...
"De la Calle" follows 15-year-old Rufino and his girlfriend, Xochitl, as they try to escape from the hopeless poverty and dead-end existence of the urban sprawl of the capital for a new life in the port city of Veracruz. They dream of gazing at the sea. Rufino hears that dockyard work should be plentiful. Complicating matters is Xochitl's infant son, more or less cared for by friends. Her visits with the boy are fleeting; Xochitl spends her time living and sleeping alongside other young orphaned addicts in the sewers while occasionally picking up the menial job or two.
Rufino is a charismatic youth and natural born leader, but he is not the upstanding hero of romantic films of yore: He is a drug runner who fearlessly scams dealers and tries to outwit his connections. Rufino has incurred the wrath of the short-fused, corrupt neighborhood cop, Ochoa, who also happens to be a volatile surrogate father figure. Then the teenager is told by a grizzled street bum that his biological father (long given up for dead) may actually be living in the vicinity. The film combines the boy's search for his long-lost parent with his and his girlfriend's struggle to tie up loose ends to head to the seaside.
If all this sounds like a melodramatic concoction of Dickensian proportion, director Gerardo Tort pulls it off with style. "De la Calle" gets high marks for its admirable lack of pretense and the momentum that propels the narrative from start to finish. Marina Stavenhagen's tight script may not break new ground, but it convincingly depicts the pathetic lives of disenfranchised youth in a living hell with restraint. Occasional artistic flourishes (such as Rufino's recurring hallucinatory dreams -- shades of Bunuel's 1950 classic "Los Olvidados" -- of a Virgin Mary apparition, glimpsed amid the tenements) don't prevent the story from moving fast and furiously toward a violent, sexual and generally downbeat conclusion.
Tort, making his feature debut, has directed and co-edited with a sure sense of story. Lensing by cinematographer (and co-producer) Hector Ortega is first-rate. Luis Fernando Pena seems perfectly natural as Rufino -- brooding but impetuous, balancing the shenanigans of a boy with the maturity of a teen who has grown up much too fast. He is certainly an actor with a future.
DE LA CALLE
Tiempo y Tono Films in association with Instituto Mexicano de Cinematografia/Foprocine/Zimat Consultores
Credits:
Director: Gerardo Tort
Screenwriter: Marina Stavenhagen
Based on a play by: Jesus Gonzalez Davila
Producers: Lillian Haugen, Hector Ortega
Director of photography: Hector Ortega
Production designer: Ana Solares
Music: Diego Herrera
Editors: Carlos Hagerman, Gerardo Tort
Cast:
Rufino: Luis Fernando Pena
Xochitl: Maya Zapata
Cero: Armando Hernandez
Ochoa: Mario Zaragoza
Lencho: Jorge Zarate
Felix: Abel Woolrich
Seno: Cristina Michaus
Amparo: Vanessa Bauche
Chicharra: Luis Felipe Tovar
Running time -- 85 minutes
No MPAA rating...
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