Oscilloscope Laboratories has announces the U.S. theatrical release of the documentary film Brimstone & Glory, the powerful debut feature by Viktor Jakovleski about the National Pyrotechnic Festival in Tultepec, Mexico.
From Benh Zeitlin and Court 13, producers of the Academy Award nominated Beasts of the Southern Wild, Brimstone & Glory opens at the Nuart Theatre in Los Angeles on October 27, and at the Quad Cinema in New York City on November 22, followed by other U.S. cities including San Francisco, Washington D.C., and Chicago.
The National Pyrotechnic Festival in Tultepec, Mexico is a site of festivity unlike any other in the world. In celebration of San Juan de Dios, patron saint of firework makers, conflagrant revelry engulfs the town for ten days. Artisans show off their technical virtuosity, up-and-comers create their own rowdy, lo-fi combustibles, and dozens of teams build larger-than-life papier-mâché bulls to parade into the town square, adorned with fireworks that blow up in all directions.
More than three quarters of Tultepec’s residents work in pyrotechnics, making the festival more than revelry for revelry’s sake. It is a celebration that anchors a way of life built around a generations-old, homegrown business of making fireworks by hand.
For the people of Tultepec, the National Pyrotechnic Festival is explosive celebration, unrestrained delight and real peril. Plunging headlong into the fire, Brimstone & Glory honors the spirit of Tultepec’s community and celebrates celebration itself.
Brimstone & Glory was the winner of the Best Documentary Feature and Best Documentary Director Awards at the most recent edition of Fantastic Fest, and has been an official selection at the True/False, Hot Docs, Sheffield, AFI Docs and Margaret Mead film festivals. The film was edited by Affonso Gonçalves and scored by Dan Romer and Benh Zeitlin, the creative team of Beasts of the Southern Wild.
