Prayers for the Stolen / Noche de fuego, the fiction debut feature by Mexican director Tatiana Huezo has nabbed a nomination for Best International Film at the 37th edition of the Independent Spirit Awards. The nominations were announced this morning by Film Independent, the organization that produces the event.
The Mexican film will be competing against Compartment No. 6 by Juho Kuosmanen (Finland/Russia), Drive My Car by Ryusuke Hamaguchi (Japan), Parallel Mothers by Pedro Almodóvar (Spain), Pebbles by P S Vinothraj (India), and Petite Maman by Céline Sciamma (France). The winners of the Independent Spirit Awards will be announced at a live ceremony on Sunday March 6, 2022.
Liberally adapted from Jennifer Clement’s eponymous 2014 novel and winner of a Special Mention in the Un Certain Regard competition at the Cannes Film Festival, and the Best Latin American Film Award at the San Sebastian Film Festival, Prayers for the Stolen is set in a solitary town nestled in the Mexican mountains, where the girls wear boyish haircuts and have hiding places underground.
The film, which is also Mexico’s Academy Award contender, follows Ana and her two best friends take over the houses of those who have fled and dress up as women when no one is watching. In their own impenetrable universe, magic and joy abound; meanwhile, their mothers train them to flee from those who turn them into slaves or ghosts. But one day, one of the girls doesn’t make it to her hideout in time.