Feature films Workers (pictured) by José Luis Valle and La Jaula de Oro by Diego Quemada-Diez were the winners at the 11th edition of the Morelia Film Festival. Workers received he prize for Best Film at the festival, while La Jaula de Oro received the prizes for Best First/Second Film, the Audience Award and the Press Award.
In Workers, these are the hours prior to Rafael’s long-awaited day of retirement as a janitor in a factory. Lidia, on the other hand, finds out that after 30 years of work as a maid in a mansion, the old lady has left the inheritance to the dog. Their past is connected by a love story, their future by an unexpected turn of events.
La Jaula de Oro tells the story of Juan, Sara and Samuel, who are all 15 years old, leave Guatemala to try to reach the United States. On their journey through Mexico, they meet Chauk, a Tzotzil man who does not speak Spanish and has no official documents. They all believe they will find a better world beyond the U.S.–Mexico border, but they soon must confront a very different reality.
In the documentary category the big winner of the festival was Nuria Ibañez's El cuarto desnudo / The Naked Room (pictured right) which was awarded the prize for Best Documentary, and Best Documentary by a Woman Filmmaker. The film portraits a whole world without leaving a single space: the doctor’s office at a children’s hospital in Mexico City. Listening to the children, their parents and the doctors allows us to have a deeper and more complex insight into both social reality and human frailty.
The 11th edition of the Morelia Film Festival took place October 17-28 in Mexico.
