Director Ángel Manuel Soto, Charm City Kings
A handful of Latin American directors and Latin American-themed films from Brazil, Cuba, Mexico, and Puerto Rico, were awarded last night at the closing awards ceremony of the 2020 Sundance Film Festival.
The Mexican drama Identifying Features / Sin señas particulares, the debut feature by Fernanda Valadez was the winner of both the Special Jury Award for Screenplay and the Audience Award in the World Dramatic competition. The film tells the story of Magdalena (played by Mercedes Hernández), who sets out on a journey in search of her disappeared son en route to the U.S. border. Traveling through desolate towns and landscapes she meets Miguel, a young man recently deported from the U.S. who is making his way home. The two accompany one another: Magdalena, looking for her son, and Miguel, eager to see his mother again, in a region where victims and aggressors ramble together.
The U.S.-Mexican co-production film I Carry You With Me / The llevo conmigo by American filmmaker Heidi Ewing took home the Audience Award and the Innovator Prize in the Next section of the festival. Based on a true story and mixing fiction and documentary narrative techniques, I Carry You With Me is a decades-spanning romance that begins in Mexico between two young men, an aspiring chef and a teacher.
Epicentro, the latest documentary from Austrian Oscar-nominated director Hubert Sauper was the winner of the Austrian director Hubert Sauper was the winner of the Grand Jury Prize in the World Cinema Documentary competition. The film is an immersive portrait of “utopian” Cuba and its resilient people a century after the explosion of the USS Maine in Havana, the event that ushered in the American Empire alongside a modern form of world conquest: cinema itself.
Brazilian filmmaker Edson Oda was the winner of the Waldo Salt Award for Best Screenplay in the U.S. Dramatic competition for the sci-fi film Nine Days, which he also directed. Starring Winston Duke, Zazie Beetz, Benedict Wong, and Bill Skarsgård, the film follows a reclusive man who conducts a series of interviews with human souls for a chance to be born.
Additionally, Charm City Kings by Puerto Rican director Ángel Manuel Soto, received the U.S. Dramatic Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast. Set in Baltimore, the film follows Mouse (Jahi Di'Allo Winston), who desperately wants to join the infamous Midnight Clique, a fearless group of dirt bike riders who rule the summertime streets. When Midnight's leader, Blax (Meek Mill), takes 14-year-old Mouse under his wing, Mouse soon finds himself torn between the straight-and-narrow and a road filled with fast money and violence.
The 2020 edition of the Sundance Film Festival took place January 23 - February 2 in Park City, Utah.
