In Memoriam: Roberto Guerra

Peruvian-born New York-based documentary filmmaker Roberto Guerra died last Friday, January 10. Born in Lima on May 22, 1942, he received a degree in engineering before switching to film. At the end of the 60s, he met filmmaker Albert Maysles on his first trip to New York City, for whom he worked filming on some of his projects.

Shortly after he met Eila Hershon, who became his professional collaborator an life partner, they married in 1991. They worked on numerous film projects for over 25 years including portraits of artists and international personalities such as Frida Kahlo, Henri Langlois, and Chanel among many others. Their work was awarded at the Montreal Festival of Films on Art, and featured in numerous film festival in New York, Edinburgh, London and Los Angeles. Their work was broadcasted in several countries through PBS, A&E, Channel Four, ZDF, and RAI TV 2. Hershon died of cancer in 1993.

In the mid-nineties, Guerra met Kathy Brew and the worked on a wide range of projects including short films, art installations, and segments for Public Television WNET's City Arts and Egg, for which they won two Emmy awards. After 17 years together, they married last August. Guerra and Brew most recently premiered their feature documentary Design is One: Lella & Massimo Vignelli, which was released at the IFC Center last October. They were working on several documentary projects. Guerra also thought video at Rutgers University.

In lieu of flowers, donations in Roberto Guerra's name are requested for the following: The Lustgarten Foundation (involved in pancreatic cancer research) or Haven Hospice.

A memorial is on the planning at the Maysles Film Institute at a later date.

Pictured: Roberto Guerra with Kathy Brew in 2012.

PURGATORIO and DOMÉSTICA Headed to MoMA's Doc Fortnight

The Museum of Modern Art has just announced its slate for its 13th annual edition of Documentary Fortnight 2014: MoMA’s International Festival of Nonfiction Film and Media, which will feature two Latino titles: Purgatorio: A Journey into the Heart of the Border by Mexican director Rodrigo Reyes and Doméstica / Housemaids by Brazilian director Gabriel Mascaro.

With striking imagery, in Purgatorio director Rodrigo Reyes re-imagines the Mexico/U.S. border as a mythical place comparable to Dante’s purgatory. Leaving politics aside, he takes a fresh look at the brutal beauty of the border and the people caught in its spell.

For Housemaids, director Gabriel Mascaro asked seven adolescents to film their family's housemaids for one week, and hand the footage over to him. Their images uncover the complex relationship that exists between housemaids and their employers, a relationship that confuses intimacy and power in the workplace and provides us with an insight into the echoes of a colonial past that linger in contemporary Brazil.

Running February 14–28 in New York City, Documentary Fortnight 2014 includes 20 feature films, 10 shorts, and two classics from 20 countries. Cinema Tropical will be co-presenting both Latin American films.

Two Brazilian Films Competing for Rotterdam's Tiger Award

As LatAm Cinema reports, the Rotterdam Film Festival has announced its full lineup for its 43rd edition, which includes two Brazilian titles competing for the festival's main prize the Tiger Award, given to first or second feature film: Riocorrente / Riverrun (pictured left) by Paulo Sacramento and Casa Grande (pictured below right) by Fellipe Barbosa.

Sacramento's film is as a film like a pressure cooker. The São Paulo metropolis seems to be about to explode in this energetic and urgent fiction debut. Everything is set in irreversible motion when a woman is torn apart by a variety of desires for two very different men. Casa Grande, the first fiction feature by  Barbosa provides a sharply drawn authentic picture of 17-year old Jean growing up among the Rio’s wealthy upper class. While Jean tries to escape his overbearing parents, they in turn try to hide their financial problems from him. Starring a mix of TV stars and non-professional actors, the coming of age drama addresses themes such as class differences and racism. 

In the Bright Future section of the festival, dedicated to emerging filmmakers, several Latin American titles will participate including Mexican films Las Voces by Carlos Armella, and Acerca de Sarah by Elisa Miller; Argentinean films Tres D by Rosendo Ruiz and El día trajo la oscuridad by Martín Desalvo; Brazilian films A história da eternidade by Camilo Cavalcante and Depois da chuva by Cláudio Marques and Marília Hughes; Cuban film Hotel Nueva Isla by Irene Gutiérrez and Javier Labrador; and the Uruguayan film El lugar del hijo by Manolo Nieto. Additionally the U.S.-Mexico production Eden by Elise DuRant and the U.S./Mexico/France/Island production L for Leisure by Lev Kalman and Whitney Horn, will also be featured.

The Spectrum Section, featuring highlights from the international festival circuit and other impressive and contemporary works will feature Argentinean film Reimon, the most recent film by Rodrigo Moreno; Chilean film Matar a un hombre by Alejandro Fernández Almendras; Brazilian film Periscópio by Kiko Goifman; the Paraguayan film Costa Dulce by Enrique Collar; the Peruvian film Regreso al templo del sol by Marco Pando. Additionally the Italian-Brazilian co-production Blood in Bahia's Hot by Italian director Aurelio Grimaldi will also be screened.

The 34rd annual Rotterdam Film Festival will take place January 22 - February 2 in the Netherlands.

Argentinean Film PAPIROSEN to Open at Lincoln Center

The Film Society of Lincoln Center has announced the U.S. theatrical run of the Argentinean documentary Papirosen by Gastón Solnicki. The film, a Film Movement release, opens for a week on January 24 at the Film Society of Lincoln Center's Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center with the filmmaker in attendance at select screenings.

Masterfully edited from nearly 200 hours of footage, Papirosen represents a decade of filmmaking, and four generations of Argentine director Solnicki's family history, culled from 8mm home videos, a VHS bar mitzvah, and original observational material. His father, Victor, emerges as the lead figure, but Solnicki highlights the entire clan. Beginning with the birth of his nephew, Mateo, and punctuated throughout by interviews with his grandmother, Pola, a Holocaust survivor, the film's scope is simultaneously epic and intimate. Papirosen is a meditation on family, history, the importance of storytelling, and the power of cinema itself.

The Argentinean film, and official selection at the Locarno, Rotterdam and New York Jewish film festivals 2012 as well as a Cinema Tropical Awards nominee for Best Documentary, has been hailed as "a unique work of historiography, equivocally concerned with the wages of the past and the vicissitudes of the present" (Jay Kuehner, Cinemascope).

Cuarón Wins Golden Globe for Best Director

Mexican filmmaker Alfonso Cuarón was awarded the prize for Best Director for his film Gravity at the 71st edition of the Golden Globes Awards which were announced this evening. It is the first time a Latino filmmaker wins the prize for Best Director at the Golden Globes.

Cuarón joins other Mexicans as winners of the award presented by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association: In 1949, Gabriel Figueroa won the the Best Cinematography Award for his work on La Perla; Actress Katy Jurado was the 1953 winner of the Best Supporting Actress Award for her performance in High Noon; three years later comedian Mario Moreno 'Cantinflas' won the prize for Best Actor (in a comedy or musical film) for his role in Around the World in 80 Days; in 1987 actor Anthony Quinn was the recipient of the Cecil B. DeMille Award; and more recently in 2007, Alejandro González iñárritu's Babel won the prize for Best Film.

The winners of the 71st edition of the Golden Globes were announced at a ceremony in Beverly Hills, California.

Amat Escalante's HELI Awarded at Palm Springs

Mexican film Heli (pictured) by Amat Escalante was awarded the Cine Latino prize for Best Ibero-American Film at the 25th edition of the Palm Springs Film Festival in California.

This year's Cine Latino prize, presented by the Guadalajara International Film Festival and the University of Guadalajara Foundation/USA, was awarded ex aequo with the Spanish film Vivir es fácil con los ojos cerrados / Living Is Easy with Eyes Closed by David Trueba.

Jury members include Anna Marie de la Fuente, Chief Latin America writer, Variety, Emilio Kauderer, music composer of Oscar winning The Secret of their Eyes, and Iván Trujillo Bolio, Director of the Guadalajara International Film Festival. The Cine Latino award comes with a cash prize of $7,500.

The jury gave a Special Mention to Chilean film Gloria by Sebastián Lelio. The festival running January 3-13 featured 191 films from 60 countries, including 46 of the 76 Oscar entries up for this year’s best foreign language film competition.