EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT Opens in U.S. Theaters This February

Oscilloscope Laboratories has announced the U.S. theatrical release of the much-anticipated Oscar-nominated Colombian film Embrace of the Serpent / El abrazo de la serpiente by Ciro Guerra.

The film opens on Wednesday, February 17 at Film Forum and Lincoln Plaza in New York City, followed by a national rollout including San Francisco, Washington DC, Miami, Atlanta, Denver, Boston. Philadelphia, Houston, among other American cities.

At once blistering and poetic, the ravages of colonialism cast a dark shadow over the South American landscape in Embrace of the Serpent, the third feature by Guerra. Filmed in stunning black-and-white, Embrace of the Serpent centers on Karamakate, an Amazonian shaman and the last survivor of his people, and the two scientists who, over the course of 40 years, build a friendship with him. The film was inspired by the real-life journals of two explorers (Theodor Koch-Grünberg and Richard Evans Schultes) who traveled through the Colombian Amazon during the last century in search of the sacred and difficult-to-find psychedelic Yakruna plant.

The film had its world premiere at Directors’ Fortnight in Cannes. where it won the top prize of the competition, and it became the first Colombian film to ever been nominated for Best Foreign Language Film.

Films from Colombia, Peru, and Argentina Awarded at Sundance

Three Latin American films -from Colombia, Peru, and Argentina- were awarded prizes at the 2016 edition of the Sundance Film Festival, it was announced this evening at the closing night ceremony.

The Colombian film Between Sea and Land / La ciénaga entre el mar y la tierra by Carlos del Castillo was the winner of the Audience Award and the Special Jury Award for Acting for leading actor Vicky Hernández and Manolo Cruz in the World Cinema Dramatic competition.

The Peruvian film When Two World Collide by Heidi Brandenburg and Mathew Orzel was the winner of the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Best Debut Feature. The Argentinean film Mi Amiga del Parque by Ana Katz was awarded the World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for Screenwriting. And, as it was previously announced, Ciro Guerra’s Embrace of the Serpent / El abrazo de la serpiente from Colombia was the winner of the Alfred B. Sloan Feature Science-in-Film Prize with a cash prize of $20,000.

In Between Sea and Land, 28-year-old Alberto lives on a swampy marsh adjacent to the Caribbean Sea, which he dreams of one day visiting. But Alberto is afflicted with a neurological disorder that confines him to his bed, and his mother, Rosa, lovingly protects and takes care of him. Alberto’s wry humor and creativity help them muster the strength to endure, and he enjoys the company of his neighbor Giselle, who showers Alberto with affection. But the life he imagines with his would-be sweetheart feels just as close-yet-out-of-reach as the sea he looks upon. As he slips into anguish, Rosa confronts her past in order to lift her son’s burden and make his dreams attainable.

Manolo Cruz (who also wrote the film) gives a tremendous performance as Alberto, inhabiting a young man trapped by physical hardship but unbound by spirit. Cruz and Carlos del Castillo directed together for this indelible first feature, which portrays the extraordinary resilience and grace of characters caught in between the margins of a beautiful place.

The 2016 edition of the Sundance Film Festival took place January 21-31 in Park City, Utah.

EMBRACE OF THE SERPENT Wins Sloan Science-in-Cinema Award at Sundance

The Colombian film Embrace of the Serpent / El abrazo de la serpiente directed by Ciro Guerra (pictured left with Cristina Gallego and Doron Weber) was announced as the winner of the Alfred P. Sloan Science-in Film-Prize with a cash prize of $20,000 at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival

The Sundance Institute announced today awards for the most promising new independent films about science and technology, including the Colombian film as recipient of the Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize.

Doron Weber, Vice President, Programs at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation said, “We are delighted to recognize Ciro Guerra's poetic work Embrace of the Serpent as the winner of the 2016 Alfred P. Sloan Feature Film Prize at the Sundance Film Festival. This beautiful film depicts the scientist as unconventional explorer and an encounter between two cultures that leads to a deeper understanding of nature and new scientific knowledge, research which continues to this day. In a year with such fine Oscar-nominated films as The Martian, Steve Jobs and Joy, Embrace of the Serpent shows how the boldest and most gifted filmmakers continue to find innovative ways of telling stories with scientific themes and characters.”

Embrace of the Serpent (pictured right) a blistering, poetic story is inspired by the original journals of scientists Theodor Koch-Grünberg and Richard Evans Schultes, who meet lone survivor Karamakate, an Amazonian shaman. Over 40 years, they develop a friendship while traveling through the Colombian Amazon in search of the sacred, psychedelic yakruna plant.

The prize was selected by a jury of film and science professionals: theater, film, and television actor Kerry Bishé; writer, director and producer, Mike Cahill; filmmaker, Shane Carruth; professor at University of Southern California, Clifford Johnson; and professor of genetics at Harvard, director of space genetics, and director of the Personal Genetics Education Project, Ting Wu.

The jury presented the award to the film for "its original and provocative portrait of a scientist and a scientific journey into the unknown, and for its unconventional depiction of how different cultures seek to understand nature."

The Sundance Film Festival runs through Sunday, January 31 at Park City, Utah.

Patricio Guzmán Nabs France's César Award Nomination

Nominations for the 41st Annual César Awards -France's national film awards- were announced this morning in Paris. This year’s selection includes renowned Chilean filmmaker Patricio Guzmán’s (pictured left) The Pearl Button / El botón de nácar for Best Documentary.

The Pearl Button premiered last year in the main competition of the 65th Berlinale, where it won the Silver Bear for Best Script. After contemplating the heavens in Nostalgia for the Light, Guzmán turns his masterful eye to the ocean to uncover the history of the indigenous people of Patagonia.

In pre-colonial times, the nomadic Kaweskar (or “water people”) lived and thrived in harmony with the sea; today they have all but vanished. Interviewing the last of the Kaweskar, Guzmán chronicles the terrible devastation wrought by this almost complete genocide, discovering an unsettling parallel to the thousands who were disappeared by more recent regimes.

Nominated in the Best Foreign Film category is Mexican director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s acclaimed Birdman. The black comedy won Best Picture at the last year’s Academy Awards ceremony. Birdman tells the story of an actor (Michael Keaton)—famous for portraying an iconic superhero—as he struggles to mount a Broadway play. In the days leading up to opening night, he battles his ego and attempts to recover his family, his career and himself. 

The 41st Annual César Awards will take place February 26, 2016 at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris, France.

Gabriel Mascaro's NEON BULL Selected for New Directors/New Films

The Film Society of Lincoln Center and The Museum of Modern Art have announced this morning the initial eight selections for the 45th edition of 
New Directors/New Films, which includes the New York premiere of the Brazilian film Neon Bull / Boi Neon (pictured) by Gabriel Mascaro. 

A rodeo movie unlike any other, Gabriel Mascaro’s Venice and Toronto prize-winning follow-up to his 2014 fiction debut August Winds tracks handsome cowboy Iremar (Juliano Cazarré) as he travels around to work at vaquejada rodeos, a Brazilian variation on the sport in which two men on horseback attempt to bring a bull down by its tail.

Iremar dreams of becoming a fashion designer, creating flamboyant outfits for his co-worker, single mother Galega (Maeve Jinkings). Along with Galega’s daughter Cacá and a bullpen worker named Zé, these complex characters, drawn with tremendous compassion and not an ounce of condescension, make up an unorthodox family, on the move across the northeast Brazilian countryside.

Sensitive to matters of gender and class, and culminating in one of the most audacious and memorable sex scenes in recent memory, Neon Bull is a quietly affirming exploration of desire and labor, a humane and sensual study of bodies at work and at play.

The 45th edition of New Directors/New Films (ND/NF), a festival dedicated to the discovery of new works by emerging and dynamic filmmaking talent, will take place March 16-27 in New York City.

Movie on Chapo’s Escape Released in Mexican Theaters

Capo: El escape del siglo / Capo: The Escape of the Century, a new movie that provides a fictional account of the escape of Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera from a maximum-security prison, was released in theaters in Mexico on Friday, just one week later after he was re-captured.

The debut feature by Axel Uriegas starring Irineo Álvarez (pictured left) as “El Chapo” was released in 128 screens, and according to preliminary box office reports it had a strong per-theater-average in its opening day. The film also stars José Sefami, Pascacio López, ristoff Raczynski, and Armando Hernández.

Originally titled Chapo: El escape del siglo, the producers reportedly decided to change the movie’s name to avoid confusions with the biopic that actress Kate del Castillo was allegedly working with Guzmán Loera. The film had been in production for many weeks now, and was originally scheduled to open this past Friday, January 15.