August 30 - September 12, 2013
Based on the success of the 2011 fall series GenMex: Recent Films from Mexico, Anthology Film Archives is partnering once again with Cinema Tropical and the Mexican Cultural Institute to present a series featuring some of the most inventive and cutting-edge filmmakers working in Mexico today.
Over the past decade, an emerging generation of filmmakers in the country has produced an impressive and internationally acclaimed body of work. Some of these filmmakers, such as Matías Meyer, Eugenio Polgovksy, Pedro González-Rubio, and Yulene Olaizola, have been able to create substantial bodies of work in a short time, each of them producing three, four, or, in the case of the exceedingly prolific Nicolás Pereda, seven feature films. Their ranks have been joined by others who have burst onto the scene more recently, with debut features and sophomore productions promising great things – including Kyzza Terrazas, Michel Lipkes, Sebastián Hofmann, Natalia Beristáin, and Michel Franco, among others.
GenMex Part II will showcase some of the most exciting films made in Mexico since the first installment of the series, five of them New York premieres, proving that this new wave of Mexican cinema is anything but a fleeting phenomenon. The program includes the New York premiere of Michel Franco’s Después de Lucía / After Lucía, winner of the top prize at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard, the Sundance favorite Halley by Sebastián Hofmann, and a special sneak preview of Natalia Beristain’s No quiero dormir sola / She Doesn’t Want to Sleep Alone, winner of the prize for Best Film at the Morelia Film Festival.
As part of the series, Anthology Film Archives will also be hosting the U.S. theatrical premiere run of Matías Meyer’s minimalist epic The Last Christeros / Los últimos Cristeros, playing August 30 – September 5.
GenMex Part II is presented by Anthology Film Archives, Cinema Tropical, and the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York. Additional support provided by National Endowment for the Arts - Art Works, the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature, New York City's Department of Cultural Affairs, and The Rolex Institute.
Special thanks to all the filmmakers, and to Jaime Jaimes and Víctor Manuel Juárez (Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores), Estrella Araiza (Vendocine); Sandro Fiorin & Alex García (FiGa Films); Sandra Gómez & Jessy Vega (Interior XIII); Shinji Kitagawa (Nara International Film Festival); Aida LiPera & Lita Robinson (Visit Films); David Pike (BrinkVision); Juan Pablo Polo (Axolote Distribución); Franka Schwabe (Bac Films); and Jacqueline Jimenez (Pantelion Films).
All films at:
Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Avenue at 2nd Street, New York City
(212) 505-5181 / www.anthologyfilmarchives.org
With the support of The Rolex Institute
COMPLETE SCHEDULE
GREATEST HITS / LOS MEJORES TEMAS
A film by Nicolás Pereda (Mexico/Canada/Netherlands, 2012, 103 min., 35mm.)
“A restless formalist and one of the most inventive practitioners of the hybrid film, the prolific Pereda casts two of his regular collaborators, Gabino Rodríguez and Teresa Sánchez, as son and mother in a domestic drama about a returning prodigal father. But the reality of the film soon starts to slip. An actor is replaced; scenes are repeated with slight variations; worlds collide as actors interact with fictional characters. Both playful and radical, Greatest Hits is one of Pereda’s most emotionally resonant films, and also, as the title suggests, a culminating work.” –First Look, Museum of the Moving Image
Friday, September 6 at 6:45pm; Sunday, September 8 at 9pm; and Monday, September 9 at 8:45pm.
New York Premiere!
AFTER LUCÍA / DESPUÉS DE LUCÍA
A film by Michel Franco (Mexico, 2012, 102 min., 35mm.)
Winner of the top prize at the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival, the sophomore feature film by Franco, “one of the finest and most imaginative young directors on the scene” (Howard Feinstein, Screen Daily), is an intense and shocking exploration of the violent effects of bullying. The film tells the story of Alejandra, who has just moved with her depressed father to Mexico City after her mother has passed away. As she starts classes in a new school, she becomes the target of escalating torment by bullies. Their torments grow in intensity and cruelty, wearing down the weary Alejandra’s resistance.
Friday, September 6 at 9:15pm; and Tuesday, September 10 at 7pm.
New York Premiere!
MITOTE / MEXICAN RITUAL
A film by Eugenio Polgovsky (Mexico, 2012, 53 min., digital video)
A shaman’s mystical invocations, a protest of furious electricians on hunger strike, and a euphoric soccer crowd collide in the Zócalo of Mexico City, the country’s central square and ancient ceremonial heart of the Aztec empire. Mitote (Nahuatl for chaos or celebration) transforms the plaza into a wrestling ring, where national commemorations, postmodern rituals, and the remains of pre-Hispanic culture clash. Polgovsky’s follow up to his acclaimed documentary film The Inheritors is an intricate portrait of the different layers that coexist – sometimes in conflict – in Mexican culture.
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New York Premiere!
FOGO
A film by Yulene Olaizola (Mexico/Canada, 2012, 61 min., digital video. In English)
The deterioration of a small community in Fogo Island, off the coast of Canada, is forcing its inhabitants to leave and resettle. Places once occupied by humans are now becoming part of the tundra landscape. In spite of a condemned future, there are some residents who decide to remain, holding on to their memories and grieving for the past, when life in Fogo was different. Olaizola’s third feature film, a minimalist Mexican-Canadian drama, follows in the footsteps of her previous film Artificial Paradises, pushing the boundaries between fiction and documentary film.
Saturday, September 7 at 4:45pm; and Wednesday, September 11 at 9pm.
INORI
A film by Pedro González-Rubio (Japan, 2012, 72 min., digital video. In Japanese with English subtitles)
“Epic. […] González-Rubio’s long, contemplative takes feel like an osmotic experience.” –G. Allen Johnson, San Francisco Chronicle
Winner of the Golden Leopard at the Locarno Film Festival, the third feature film by acclaimed director González-Rubio (Alamar) is a stunning and poetic documentary shot in a tiny mountain community in Japan, made at the invitation of Japanese director Naomi Kawase and the Nara Film Festival. Blending documentary and narrative, Inori (Japanese for ‘prayer’) depicts the lives of the aging population of the isolated village. As the younger generations have left to look for work elsewhere, the remaining elderly inhabitants perform their everyday routine with stoicism and dignity.
Saturday, September 7 at 7:15pm; and Thursday, September 12 at 9pm.
MALAVENTURA
A film by Michel Lipkes (Mexico, 2011, 67 min., 35mm.)
“Beautiful. […] Lipkes proves in this opera prima that he is a talent to watch.” –Howard Feinstein, Screen Daily
Lipkes’s slow-burning film follows a nameless elderly man (played by non-actor Issac López) on his last day of life in the seedy streets of downtown Mexico City. Beset by memories, he roams through his past while everyday life slips by him. “Rendered with intensity and rigor” (Robert Koehler, Variety), Malaventura marks the auspicious and dignified filmmaking debut of film critic and programmer Lipkes.
Saturday, September 7 at 9pm; and Monday, September 9 at 7pm.
MACHETE LANGUAGE / EL LENGUAJE DE LOS MACHETES
A film by Kyzza Terrazas (Mexico, 2011, 84 min., digital video)
Ray (Andrés Almeida), a revolutionary activist, and Ramona (real-life singer Jessy Bulbo), a rebellious punk rock girl, are a young couple who hate inequality and social injustice in their country, and together try to advocate for a better world. Pushed over the edge by the violent repression in Salvador Atenco, they feel increasingly drawn to commit a terrorist act in the name of their political beliefs and their love. Terrazas’s poignant directorial debut is a frenetic love story in a self-destructive political activist context, set to the rhythm of punk rock.
Sunday, September 8 at 5pm; and Thursday, September 12 at 7pm.
New York Premiere!
HALLEY
A film by Sebastián Hofmann (Mexico, 2012, 84 min., digital video)
Co-presented by Latin Horror
"Beto, a security guard in a Mexico City gym, quietly observes the healthy bodies of the muscle-bound patrons, which contrast sharply with his own physical deterioration. Afflicted with a strange illness, Beto surrenders to his condition and holes up in his apartment, injecting himself with embalming fluid to stem his increasing decay. Beto’s melancholy grows as he realizes – in the words of an affable morgue attendant – that ‘the diseased become the disease.’ Through the friendly advances of the gym’s female owner, Beto dances with the illusory promise of feeling alive again. Hofmann’s increasingly surrealistic feature debut subverts genre conventions and audience expectations, treating its living-dead protagonist with sensitivity and compassion." –Sundance Film Festival
Sunday, September 8 at 7pm; and Tuesday, September 10 at 9:15pm.
Special Sneak-Preview Screening!
SHE DOESN’T WANT TO SLEEP ALONE / NO QUIERO DORMIR SOLA
A film by Natalia Beristain (Mexico, 2012, 82 min., digital video)
Amanda is 33 years old and suffers from a condition: she cannot sleep alone. Her dull life is suddenly altered when she is forced to take care of her old alcoholic grandmother, Dolores (played by veteran actress Adriana Roel), a retired actress who lives on her past glories. Largely based on the filmmaker’s relationship to her grandmother, Beristain’s promising feature film, which had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, was the winner of the prize for Best Film at the 2012 Morelia Film Festival.
Wednesday, September 11 at 7pm.
New York Theatrical Premiere Run!
THE LAST CHRISTEROS / LOS ÚLTIMOS CRISTEROS
A film by Matías Meyer (Mexico/Netherlands, 2011, 90 min., 35mm.)
Matías Meyer’s The Last Christeros is a highly unusual historical film that takes a meditative, nearly non-narrative approach to portraying the experiences of those who continued to resist the Mexican government’s anti-Christian (especially anti-Roman Catholic) persecution, even following the official end of the Cristero War in 1929. Devoted to the cause, despite their increasing desperation and fatigue, and their yearning to rejoin their families, this band of rebels – whose genuine religious faith and spiritual innocence is apparent despite their paradoxical embrace of armed struggle – trudges exhaustedly through the hills and mountains of rural Mexico, experiencing moments of grace and beauty amid the violence and suffering. This third feature by Meyer (following Wadley and The Cramp) decisively establishes him as one of the most gifted of young Mexican filmmakers, and represents a striking combination of minimalist cinema and historical depiction. Eschewing a narrative chronicle of the War’s events, Meyer instead puts us in his weary fighters’ shoes, and emphasizes the quiet, strangely tranquil moments between battles.
Friday, August 30 through Thursday, September 5, nightly at 7pm and 9pm, additional screenings on 8/31 and 9/1 at 5pm.
Unless otherwise noted, all films are in Spanish with English subtitles.
Dennis Lim writes about film and popular culture for various publications including The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. He is the founding editor of Moving Image Source, the online publication and research resource of the Museum of the Moving Image and was formerly the film editor of The Village Voice. His work has also appeared in The Believer, The Oxford American, Blender, Spin, Espous, Indiewire, New York Daily News, The Independent on Sunday, The Guardian, and the film quarterly Cinema Scope, where he is a contributing editor. A member of the National Society of Film Critics and the editor of The Village Voice Film Guide (2006), he has served as a member of the New York Film Festival selection committee and he teaches in the Cultural Reporting and Criticism graduate program a New York University.
Matías Piñeiro is a filmmaker and professor at the Universidad del Cine in Buenos Aires. His first feature-length work, El hombre robado / The Stolen Man (2007), won awards at the Jeonju International Film Festival and at Las Palmas de Gran Canaria International Film Festival. In 2009, his second feature, Todos mienten / They All Lie, premiered at BAFICI (Buenos Aires Festival International de Cine Independiente), where it won two awards. It also won a prize at the Santiago Festival Internacional de Cine. In 2010, he was selected—along with James Benning and Denis Côté—to screen his third film, Rosalinda at the 11th Jeonju Digital Project. Piñeiro recently premiered his most recent film, Viola, at the Toronto Film Festival, and it's slated for a US release in 2013. He earned a filmmaking degree from Universidad del Cine. His award-winning films have been screened around the world, including at Anthology Film Archives, Festival des 3 Continents, the Festival del film Locarno, the London Film Festival, Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires, the Museum of Modern Art, Rencontré Cinémas d’Amerique Latine de Toulouse, and the Viennale.
Frida Torresblanco served as a producer in Spain working on film including The Dancer Upstairs, directed by John Malkovich and starring Javier Bardem, as well as Susan Seidelman’s Gaudi Afternoon. She moved to New York City in 2002 to launch and lead Alfonso Cuaron’s film production company, Esperanto, where she served as Executive Producer and Creative On-Set Producer for The Assassination of Richard Nixon (directed by Niels Mueller, starring Sean Penn), among others. In 2006, Frida joined Alfonso Cuarón and Guillermo del Toro to produce El laberinto del Fauno / Pan’s Labyrinth (Three Oscars & another three Oscar nominations; three wins & five BAFTA nominations; a nomination for the Palm d’Or and a Golden Globe). The Hollywood Reporter named Frida one of the 50 most powerful Latinos in Hollywood. She also produced Rudo y Cursi (directed by Carlos Cuarón, starring Gael García Bernal and Diego Luna). In 2010, Frida launched her new film production company, Braven Films, with partners Eric Laufer and Giovanna Randall. Her next project, Magic Magic, produced through Braven Films, will star Michael Cera, Juno Temple and Emily Browning.
Ryan Harrington is the Director of Documentary Programs at the Tribeca Film Institute where he oversees the Gucci Tribeca Documentary Fund, the TFI Documentary Fund, Tribeca All Access documentary program and the Latin America Media Arts Fund while developing other initiatives and programs that support non-fiction filmmaking. Recent TFI successes include Give Up Tomorrow, If a Tree Falls, The Redemption of General Butt Naked, The Oath, Enemies of the People, Marathon Boy and Donor Unknown. Independently he is currently working on the feature doc Hungry in America, with filmmakers Kristi Jacobson & Lori Silverbush and Participant Media, that explores why so many people in the USA go without food, and what can be done about it. Harrington managed production for A&E IndieFilms, the theatrical documentary arm of the A&E Network, for four years. Throughout his time there he championed the Oscar-nominated films Murderball and Jesus Camp, and the Sundance hits My Kid Could Paint That and American Teen. 
Paula Heredia is a director and editor based in New York. She was awarded an Emmy for the HBO documentary In Memoriam, NYC 9/11/01, and an ACE Eddie Award for the acclaimed documentary Unzipped. Her directorial work includes the documentaries George Plimpton and the Paris Review, Ralph Gibson, and The Couple in the Cage. Her dramatic work includes Having a Baby, Tras La Ventana, Slings and Arrows, and La Cena de Matrimonio. Her short film La Pájara Pinta premiered at the Lincoln Center Film Society LatinBeat Film Festival. Heredia’s editorial work can be seen in the HBO feature-length documentary Addiction, which received the 2007 Emmy Governors Award, and Alive Day Memories—Home from Iraq, executive produced by James Gandolfini for HBO. Her new edit, The Art of Failure: Chuck Connelly Not for Sale and Jacques D'Ambois in China, will air on HBO this summer. Other editorial credits include: Modulations Cinema for the Ear, The Vagina Monologues, Finding Christa and Free Tibet. Paula’s work and creative process is featured in the book: The Art of the Documentary by Megan Cunningham. With partner Larry Garvin, she co-founded Heredia Pictures, heads the international committee of New York Women in Film and Television and serves on the board of advisors of Tribeca All Access and Clementina, Inc. 
Chi-hui Yang is a film programmer, lecturer and writer based in New York. As a guest curator, Yang has presented film and video series at film festivals and events internationally, including MoMA's Documentary Fortnight, Robert Flaherty Film Seminar (“The Age of Migration”), Seattle International Film Festival, Washington D.C. International Film Festival and Barcelona Asian Film Festival. From 2000-2010 he was the Director and Programmer of the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, the largest showcase of its kind in the US. Yang is also the programmer of “Cinema Asian America,” a new On-Demand service offered by Comcast and currently a Visiting Scholar at New York University’s Asian/Pacific/American Institute.
