January 2017 — February 2020
Anthology Film Archives

 

New York City, despite its status as a world capital of cinema, regularly misses out on screenings of many key international films. Though the exhibition of Latin American cinema in the city has drastically increased over the past decade, a considerable number of influential movies from the region still fail to premiere locally. Anthology Film Archives and Cinema Tropical have partnered to create a new and exciting series of monthly screenings featuring remarkable Latin American films making their local premiere. Far from minor works, the films included here are by some of the region’s most important filmmakers, have garnered major awards at international festivals, and provide an important window into the often overlooked world of Latin American cinema.

Co-presented by Anthology Film Archives and Cinema Tropical. Programmed by Matías Piñeiro and Carlos A. Gutiérrez. 

Special thanks to Fábio Andrade, Cecilia Barrionuevo, Cavi Borges, Emilie Lesclaux, and Mary Jane Marcasiano.

 

All screenings at Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Avenue (at 2nd Street), New York City
(212) 505-5181 / www.anthologyfilmarchives.org

  

January — March 2020

THE SKY OF THE CENTAUR / EL CIELO DEL CENTAURO
A film by Hugo Santiago
(Argentina/France, 2015, 93 min. In Spanish and French with English subtitles)

The ship moors at dawn in Buenos Aires, from where it will sail again the next day. The Engineer goes down to the city to honor his father’s request: deliver a small package to one of his friends, Victor Zagros. When the package is taken away from him the Engineer embarks on a wild and dizzying quest, within a city, a sort of “wonder box” that little by little seems out of this world. The last film by the great Hugo Santiago (Invasión, Les Autres), The Sky of the Centaur was written in collaboration with Mariano Llinás (La Flor), edited by Alejo Moguillansky, and features performances by Malik Zidi and Romina Paula.

“Geometry is of great importance in my cinema. And this film is built as a geometric theorem. The engineer works himself very well with the maps, marks the route that allows him to quickly visualize each site of the city. And with them he discovers every stage of that succession of events that is the path of the film itself.” –Hugo Santiago

Monday, March 9, 7:15pm

 

LAPÜ
(César Alejandro Jaimes and Juan Pablo Polanco, Colombia, 2019, 75 min. In Wayuunaiki and Spanish with English subtitles)

Winner, Best Latin American Documentary, Cinema Tropical Awards
Official Selection, Sundance Film Festival
Official Selection, Berlin Film Festival

“When Doris’s dead cousin appears to her in a dream, the vision prompts her to embark upon the most important ritual of the Wayuu, an indigenous group living in Colombia’s Guajira Desert. To ensure that her cousin may rest in peace, Doris must exhume the bones of the deceased and clean them before burying them a second time. With the support of her mother and grandmother, she sets out on a richly sensorial journey that brings her into close contact with the dead and their world. Together with their protagonist, César Alejandro Jaimes and Juan Pablo Polanco have crafted a debut film full of haunting images and sounds, with a diaphanous aesthetic that gives form to the unseen. The camera glides smoothly and naturally between different worlds and forms of existence, between day and night, moving back and forth from blazing light to all-enveloping darkness. The filmmakers’ gentle gaze combines intimacy and distance at the same time. More than the ritual, they are interested in the faces of its participants, across which flicker suspicion, curiosity, and fascination.” —Hanna Keller, Berlinale Forum

Thursday, February 6, 7:15pm

CHÃO / LANDLESS
(Camila Freitas, Brazil, 2019, 110 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)

“Over a period of four years, Camila Freitas documented the lives of a group of landless workers in the Brazilian state of Goiás. Since 2015, the workers have occupied a portion of a factory site and demanded land reform. CHÃO provides insights into the group’s everyday routine, which is divided between tilling the land, political activism, and talk of what a better future might look like. The film thus delves into the microstructures of local political action while also demonstrating just how dependent the Landless Workers Movement is on Brazilian politics, global capital, and the agricultural industry. Occupying a space between frank realism and potent atmospherics that draw their power from poetic digressions, such as deliberately exaggerated moments on the soundtrack, impressionistic close-ups, and cinematographic micro-narrations, CHÃO documents life in the resistance, where hope can sometimes seem like the only thing capable of countering the realities of the world. It was only recently that Jair Bolsonaro, the new president of Brazil, added the landless to the list of enemies of the nation and called on landowners to take up arms to defend their property.” —Alejandro Bachmann, Berlinale Forum

Tuesday, January 14, 7:15pm

PARAGUAY WAR / GUERRA DO PARAGUAI
(Luiz Rosemberg Filho, Brazil, 2016, 80 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)

U.S. Premiere!

The last feature film by the late Brazilian cinema Luiz Rosemberg Filho, a key figure of the Cinema Marginal movement whose work has been little seen in the U.S., is a lyrical allegory about a bloody war, in which past and present, and barbarism and art collide. The film follows a soldier coming home after the Paraguay War—the infamous conflict fought between 1864-1870 between the South American nation against the triple alliance of Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay, that marked one of the bloodiest episodes in South American history—who runs into a contemporary theater troupe. Shot in black and white, Rosemberg Filho’s is an astonishing tour de force on the persistence of life past destructive masculinity.

Thursday, December 12, 7:15pm

CRITICO (Kleber Mendonça Filho, Brazil, 2008, 80 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)The documentary debut feature by acclaimed Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho (Neighboring Sounds, Bacurau), explores the troubled relationship between…

CRITICO
(Kleber Mendonça Filho, Brazil, 2008, 80 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)

The documentary debut feature by acclaimed Brazilian filmmaker Kleber Mendonça Filho (Neighboring Sounds, Bacurau), explores the troubled relationship between filmmakers and critics through a personal series of interviews recorded over a period of eight years between 1998 and 2007. Featuring 70 filmmakers and critics, including major international figures such as David Lynch, Fernando Meirelles, Eduardo Coutinho, and Aki Kaurismaki, Crítico opens a much-needed window to an art which is increasingly judged by industry standards and which struggles to remain human in the way it is realized and observed.

Wednesday, November 13, 7:15pm

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH THAT I JUST DON’T KNOW / TE QUIERO TANTO QUE NO SÉ (Lautaro García Candela, Argentina, 2017, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles,U.S. Premiere!  Francisco can’t stop thinking about Paula, an old friend he recently ran into f…

I LOVE YOU SO MUCH THAT I JUST DON’T KNOW / TE QUIERO TANTO QUE NO SÉ
(Lautaro García Candela, Argentina, 2017, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles, US Premiere)

Francisco can’t stop thinking about Paula, an old friend he recently ran into for the first time in years. When he sees on Facebook that she’s in a bar nearby, he goes out in search of her. But along the way, his brother asks him for help with his girlfriend, he runs into an old friend, plays a football match almost against his will, receives an old film reel that contains a hidden movie, and has to rescue a friend from a bad date.

”A critic friend of mine says that movies no longer dialogue with history, but are the filmmaker’s subconscious, filmed for the world to see. He means it pejoratively, but it seems to me that it is a good way to define my film. The political and the historical are in the air: it is impossible not to be contemporary.” —Lautaro García Candela

Monday, October 14, 7:15pm

THE ENDLESS DAY / EL DÍA QUE RESISTÍA
(Alessia Chiesa, Argentina, 2018, 98 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

Alone in an isolated house in the countryside, Fan, Tino, and Claa (9, 7, and 5) wait for their parents to come back. Among games and tales, the waiting becomes unusually long while the solitude grows unsettling. In the midst of a strange and confusing atmosphere, the children’s apparently innocent and playful world begins to reveal its darker side.

The Endless Day represents the unimaginable dark side of the world of childhood through a tone of strangeness. It looks in a slightly different way at situations that would normally be perceived as banal or go unnoticed, making them feel odd and out of place and thus opening the door to many questions. This film constructs storytelling through feelings, atmosphere, and questions rather than pretending to provide answers that would directly and simply satisfy the spectator but also withdraw from them the possibility of a personal opening and discovery.” –Alessia Chiesa

Thursday, September 5, 7:15pm

THE DISCIPLE OF SPEED / LA DISCÍPULA DEL VELOCÍMETRO
(Miguel Calderón, Mexico, 2008, 66 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

U.S. Premiere! / Filmmaker in person
Co-presented by the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York

“In this biographical documentary about the 50-year-old Mexican multimillionaire Emma, visual artist Miguel Calderón shows how reality can far surpass fiction in improbability. Basically his film is made up of the video research for a full-length film. The way Emma garnered her fortune remains unclear and unimportant. However, the way in which that money makes it possible for her to go to the limit in her extreme hobbies and activities becomes overwhelmingly clear. The eccentric millionaire, mother of a strange adolescent son, has a black belt in karate, is a stuntwoman and artiste, and claims to have paranormal gifts. Calderón follows her during races, film recordings, paragnostic performances, and dinners with friends, but is – rightly – just as interested in the thoughts of the 25 bodyguards and in her son’s gun collection. The woman is entirely convinced of herself and has no trouble linking together different worlds. But Calderón, who wields the camera, increasingly becomes the frustrated protagonist in his own failed project.” –International Rotterdam Film Festival

Thursday, August 1, 7:15pm

THE DEATH OF THE MASTER / LA MUERTE DEL MAESTRO  (José María Avilés, Ecuador/Argentina, 2018, 62 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)  U.S. Premiere! Co-presented by Kinoscope and the Ecuadorian Film Festival New York  “On April 16, 2016, a sever…

THE DEATH OF THE MASTER / LA MUERTE DEL MAESTRO
(José María Avilés, Ecuador/Argentina, 2018, 62 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

U.S. Premiere!
Co-presented by Kinoscope and the Ecuadorian Film Festival New York


“On April 16, 2016, a severe earthquake hit coastal Ecuador. José María Avilés’s first feature film is based on this national disaster, but at a great distance from the collapsed buildings and buried loved ones. He shows how an unexpected event can suddenly modify all the rules of the game, even in the remote town of Angamarca – the setting of the film – where the effects of the quake arrive as distant echoes of hostility in the natural environment. An elderly farmer has become one with the land, the lemon trees, and the livestock. But something has changed; nature is disturbed. Water doesn’t run off well, a calf dies for no reason, and the wind keeps picking up. Acting calmly, yet with rising desperation, the ‘maestro’ adheres to his daily routine, trying to get things back on track. It will kill him, that’s certain.” –International Film Festival Rotterdam

Thursday, July 11, 7:15pm

THE OMISSION / LA OMISIÓN (Sebastián Schjaer, Argentina, 2018, 86 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)U.S. premiere!“In a snowy and industrial city in the south of Argentina, Paula, a 23-year-old girl from Buenos Aires, starts an intense job hunt…

THE OMISSION / LA OMISIÓN
(Sebastián Schjaer, Argentina, 2018, 86 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

U.S. premiere!

“In a snowy and industrial city in the south of Argentina, Paula, a 23-year-old girl from Buenos Aires, starts an intense job hunt with the sole purpose of saving money. The lack of a job, a home and a stable emotional environment will end up turning that search into a personal and introspective journey. She will have to deal with the hard living conditions in the south as well as with the unsolved aspects of her life, which will gradually be revealed. She knows she is shouting, but she can’t hear herself. Resembling a combination of Carey Mulligan, Sandra Huller, and Michelle Williams, Brito—next to be seen prominently in a feature-length documentary by American avant-garde legend James Benning—keeps Paula flintily sympathetic throughout. She etches a subtle and believable portrait of an astute person experienced far beyond her tender years, and considerably tougher than her gamine looks suggest.” —Neil Young, Hollywood Reporter

Thursday, June 27, 7:15pm

STRANGE BUT TRUE / EXTRAÑO PERO VERDADERO (Michel Lipkes, Mexico, 2017, 93 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)New York premiere! Filmmaker in personCo-presented by Proyector“Jonathan and Yesi are in love, but fearfully keep this from Mister Clea…

STRANGE BUT TRUE / EXTRAÑO PERO VERDADERO
(Michel Lipkes, Mexico, 2017, 93 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York premiere!
Filmmaker in person

Co-presented by Proyector

“Jonathan and Yesi are in love, but fearfully keep this from Mister Clean, their dodgy boss on the bin wagons. In Mexico City, there is no end to the refuse. Cardboard and plastic are separated on the spot, and half-empty bottles of drink finished off in one go; for tips, they will collect the refuse from your kitchen. Everything changes when a body turns up among the containers, its pockets stuffed with cash. Mister Clean comes up with a plan that will benefit them all. In today’s Mexico, it’s simply impossible not to get tangled up in the wretchedness of the violent underworld. This second feature by Michel Lipkes shows an inescapable downward spiral – though not without a glimmer of hope—in luscious black-and-white. Film buff Lipkes nods to masters through clever references and symbolism, making Strange but True both an homage and movie-spotter’s delight on several levels. Hope, love, and belief in the power of cinema.” —Rotterdam International Film Festival.

Thursday, May 9, 7:15pm

THE WEAK ONES / LOS DÉBILES (Raúl Rico & Eduardo Giralt Brun, Mexico, 2018, 65 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)“The stoic Victor gets into an argument with The Selfie, a member of a youth gang. Soon afterwards, Victor’s dogs are murdered.…

THE WEAK ONES / LOS DÉBILES
(Raúl Rico & Eduardo Giralt Brun, Mexico, 2018, 65 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

“The stoic Victor gets into an argument with The Selfie, a member of a youth gang. Soon afterwards, Victor’s dogs are murdered. He arms himself and sets out for revenge, in search of the rival who’s now disappeared without a trace. But the journey proves difficult, taking Victor through Sinaloa, the stretch of land on Mexico’s Pacific coast that a ruthless criminal cartel has transformed into bloody terrain. Violence and death are part of everyday life here. Victor’s journey is hemmed in by an eccentric cast of characters, each of whom reveals a new clue on where The Selfie might be found – until the two rivals finally meet in a brilliant and unexpected finale.

“With The Weak Ones, directors Raúl Rico and Eduardo Giralt Brun deliver a contemporary spin on a classic tale of crime and punishment, a virtuoso accomplishment that achieves the seemingly impossible: a revenge film in which the need for vengeance ultimately fades into the background. With calm and composed camera work and marvelously droll humor, they have created a road movie extraordinarily rich in atmosphere, featuring striking locales in a fascinating landscape that manages to be two things at once: heaven and hell.” —Berlinale Forum
Thursday, April 11, 7:15pm

NOELÍ OVERSEAS (Noelí en los países, Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas, Dominican Republic, 2017, 54 min. In Spanish, English, and French with English subtitles)  Yanet Mojica, a young actress, made her cinematic debut alongside Geraldine Chap…

NOELÍ OVERSEAS
(Noelí en los países, Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas, Dominican Republic, 2017, 54 min. In Spanish, English, and French with English subtitles)

Yanet Mojica, a young actress, made her cinematic debut alongside Geraldine Chaplin in Laura Amelia Guzmán and Israel Cárdenas’s 2014 film, Sand Dollars. In their more recent documentary/fiction hybrid, Noelí Overseas, Mojica takes center stage.

“Hired to star in a fashion infomercial to be shot in Venice in the majestic Hotel Excelsior, Yanet sets foot in Europe for the first time. Once the prudishness of the crew members has been overcome, she joyously drags them along into a Caribbean universe made up of rhythm and dance. Although the filmmakers still dream of exile, the empowerment of a young woman is what ultimately manifests itself here. Yanet lives on the screen through her strength and her grace. She tackles every moment with lightheartedness. The image and its relationship with the sound design lends an almost phantasmagorical feel to certain sequences while depicting these elements through a discerning distance.” —Visions du Réel

Thursday, March 14, 7:15pm

THE ENDLESS FILM / LA PELÍCULA INFINITA (Leandro Listorti, Argentina, 2018, 54 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)New York Premiere!  The Endless Film stands as a contemporary cinematic Frankenstein. Made from different fragments of unfinished, …

THE ENDLESS FILM / LA PELÍCULA INFINITA
(Leandro Listorti, Argentina, 2018, 54 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere!

The Endless Film stands as a contemporary cinematic Frankenstein. Made from different fragments of unfinished, abandoned, or unrealized Argentine films, this film-essay tells the story of a parallel history of cinema. An endless film is a film that has no end, a film that has not reached its destiny. From this limbo, Listorti gathers these orphan images and silenced sounds and finds a new opportunity to screen their stories. Not only a filmmaker, Listorti nurtures his talented film practice with his experience as an archivist in the film museum Pablo Hickens Ducros in Buenos Aires. The Endless Film is composed of the remains of such films as El eternauta by Hugo Gil (1968); La neutrónica explotó en Burzaco by Alejandro Agresti (1984); Zama by Nicolás Sarquís (1984); Sistema español by Martín Rejtman (1988); and El ocio by Mariano Llinás and Agustín Mendilaharzu (1999); among others. With the voices of musician and actress Rosario Bléfari and filmmaker and writer Edgardo Cozarinsky, The Endless Film proposes itself as a negative journey through creation, memory, and loneliness.

“In a country where the remains are of fundamental importance in understanding the past, The Endless Film offers a window to forgotten memories, and invites the viewer to evaluate its own culture and identity.” –Rotterdam Film Festival

Thursday, February 7, 7:15pm

THE WAVES / LAS OLAS (Adrián Biniez, Uruguay/Argentina, In Spanish with English subtitles, 2017, 88 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)  New York Premiere! Q&A with producer Fernando Epstein  The third feature film by Argentine-born, Uruguay…

THE WAVES / LAS OLAS
(Adrián Biniez, Uruguay/Argentina, In Spanish with English subtitles, 2017, 88 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere!
Q&A with producer Fernando Epstein


The third feature film by Argentine-born, Uruguay-based filmmaker Adrián Biniez (Gigante, El Cinco) is a playful, imaginative, and existentialist time-traveling tale about a man’s misadventures. Exhausted after leaving work, Alfonso, a man in his late thirties, goes to the beach and dives into the sea. Coming to the surface, he finds himself on another beach, in another time. His parents are waiting for him, calling to him from the water’s edge.

Alfonso sees and understands everything as an adult, even if they treat him like an 11 year old. So begins a fantastic, achronological voyage through the various holidays of his life, as he comes face to face with past girlfriends, teenage and childhood pals, his daughter, and his own loneliness.

Thursday, January 17, 7:15pm

THE TERRITORIES / LOS TERRITORIOS (Iván Granovsky, Argentina/Brazil, 2017, 93 min. In Spanish, English, Arabic, and Basque with English subtitles) New York PremiereAfter the attack on Charlie Hebdo, Iván, a young film producer and self-proclaimed “f…

THE TERRITORIES / LOS TERRITORIOS
(Iván Granovsky, Argentina/Brazil, 2017, 93 min. In Spanish, English, Arabic, and Basque with English subtitles)
New York Premiere

After the attack on Charlie Hebdo, Iván, a young film producer and self-proclaimed “frivolous” son of a prominent Argentine journalist, sets off on a journey to sites of contemporary geopolitical conflict. It is no easy undertaking. Determining where the frontline ends and this wannabe war correspondent’s ego trip begins proves even more difficult. It’s seemingly a miracle that this film even exists. As the director and protagonist Iván Granovsky relates with a sense of self-mockery, his three previous attempts to make a film turned into fiascos, so he decided to follow in the footsteps of his father. But from the refugee crisis in Greece to the less-democratic Brazil, from the Basque Country to Jerusalem, Granovsky is always too late, too early, in the wrong place, or asking clumsy questions. The Territories is a coming-of-age fiction nestled inside a geopolitical documentary.

Tuesday, December 18, 7:15pm

RUSTLERS / CUATREROS (Albertina Carri, Argentina, 2016, 85 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)Q&A with director Albertina Carri  Inspired by the first book written by her father, sociologist Roberto Carri, acclaimed filmmaker Albertina Carri…

RUSTLERS / CUATREROS
(Albertina Carri, Argentina, 2016, 85 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

Q&A with director Albertina Carri

Inspired by the first book written by her father, sociologist Roberto Carri, acclaimed filmmaker Albertina Carri (Los Rubios) travels to northern Argentina, following in the footsteps of Isidro Velázquez. The country’s last cuatrero or rustler, Velázquez was accused of stealing cattle and shot dead by police in 1967. Constructing the narrative through archival footage, home videos, ads, movies, and interviews, and framing it with the search for a lost film based on her father’s book, Carri’s visually vibrant documentary—a favorite at the Berlin and Mar del Plata film festivals—tells a story full of legends, families, politics, and cinema.

Friday, October 19, 7:15pm

TWO IRENES / AS DUAS IRENES (Fabio Meira, Brazil, 2017, 89 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)Q&A with director Fabio Meira  By chance, Brazilian teenager Irene (newcomer Priscila Bittencourt, in an assured performance) discovers that the…

TWO IRENES / AS DUAS IRENES
(Fabio Meira, Brazil, 2017, 89 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)

Q&A with director Fabio Meira

By chance, Brazilian teenager Irene (newcomer Priscila Bittencourt, in an assured performance) discovers that there is another 13-year-old Irene living in the same town. Curiously, she observes the confident, cheerful girl who lives alone with her mother. She is fascinated by this other world beyond the bounds of her own well-to-do and traditional family. This other Irene seems free. Soon the two girls, apparently so different from each other, are spending every day together, meeting up with boys in the cinema or going to the lake. When they start talking about their fathers, they notice that they have more in common than they had thought. Winner of the Best First Feature and Best Cinematography awards at the Guadalajara Film Festival, this debut feature by Fabio Meira is an exquisite mosaic that weaves a wonderfully delicate web around questions of identity, true friendship, and the first steps towards adulthood.

Monday, November 5, 7:15pm

WILLIAM, THE NEW JUDO MASTER / WILLIAM, EL NUEVO MAESTRO DEL JUDO (Ricardo Silva & Omar Guzmán, Mexico, 2016, 96 min. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. Premiere! Co-presented by Proyector“Back in the 1950s, Swedish-American singer William …

WILLIAM, THE NEW JUDO MASTER / WILLIAM, EL NUEVO MAESTRO DEL JUDO
(Ricardo Silva & Omar Guzmán, Mexico, 2016, 96 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere!
Co-presented by Proyector

“Back in the 1950s, Swedish-American singer William Clauson had a worldwide hit with ‘La Bamba.’ Now he lives in a ramshackle garage in Tijuana, Mexico. In William, the New Judo Master, directors Ricardo Silva and Omar Guzmán show how a Mexican nurse washes his naked old body. ‘How did we get here?’ a voiceover muses. ‘What road led us here? When did we take it?’ This fascinating film essay is about the struggle against time, old age, and transitoriness. Silva’s debut film, Navajazo (2014), was already a hybrid form of documentary and fiction, but here (with Guzmán) he goes further, producing a surrealist collage. For example, going on a trip to the oldest tree in the world. Or having a middle-aged actor play Clauson, while he is visited by three male prostitutes. Meanwhile, the devil looks on, eyes glowing red.” –International Film Festival Rotterdam

Thursday, September 20, 7:30pm

RESURRECTION / RESURRECCIÓN (Eugenio Polgovsky, Mexico, 2016, 94 min, digital. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. Premiere! Co-presented by the Flaherty Film Seminar and ProyectorThe final film by the late Mexican director Eugenio Polgovsky—on…


RESURRECTION / RESURRECCIÓN
(Eugenio Polgovsky, Mexico, 2016, 94 min, digital. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere!
Co-presented by the Flaherty Film Seminar and Proyector

The final film by the late Mexican director Eugenio Polgovsky—one of the finest documentary filmmakers of his generation—is a poignant portrait of a family’s fight for survival and the regeneration of their local river. Once known as the Mexican Niagara, the waterfall of El Salto de Juanacatlán was a source of immense joy and continuous sustenance for the villages surrounding it. This natural paradise disappeared when an industrial complex was established across the Santiago River close to Guadalajara. Nowadays its poisonous waters destroy everything in their path, including the memories of the fishermen and farmers who watched their whole world disappear. From among the toxic ruins of the river’s banks, ancient specters emerge as an echo of a lost Eden. The destiny of a river goes hand in hand with that of a village, and humanity itself. The film is screened on the occasion of the first anniversary of the death of Polgovsky.

Preceded by Success (Eugenio Polgovsky, Mexico, 2014, 3 min.)

Tuesday, August 14, 7:30pm

SO LONG, ENTHUSIASM / ADIÓS ENTUSIASMO (Vladimir Durán, Argentina/Colombia, 2017, 79 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)  U.S. Premiere!  The acclaimed debut feature by Colombian filmmaker Vladimir Durán—a favorite at the Berlinale’s Forum and w…

SO LONG, ENTHUSIASM / ADIÓS ENTUSIASMO
(Vladimir Durán, Argentina/Colombia, 2017, 79 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

U.S. Premiere!

The acclaimed debut feature by Colombian filmmaker Vladimir Durán—a favorite at the Berlinale’s Forum and winner of the Best Director and Best Colombian Film awards at the Cartagena Film Festival—follows Axel and his older sisters Antonia, Alejandra, and Alicia. They live in an apartment that becomes their kingdom ruled by extravagant policies that they’ve imposed, including locking up their mother, Margarita, in a room. The children communicate with their mother through a small window, giving her blankets, DVDs and reading material, and celebrating her birthday in the corridor. When she’s eventually had enough, it’s Axel who must decide what to do. Shot in Argentina, So Long, Enthusiasm establishes Durán as a talent to watch.

Thursday, July 12, 7:30pm

PANKE (Alejo Franzetti, Argentina, 46 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)New York Premiere Q&A with director Alejo Franzetti“Panke is an ode to survival; a very careful meditation on the melancholy of immigrants, made with a tone at once con…

PANKE
(Alejo Franzetti, Argentina, 46 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere
Q&A with director Alejo Franzetti

Panke is an ode to survival; a very careful meditation on the melancholy of immigrants, made with a tone at once convincing and detached. The main character has nothing but the memories of his mother in Burkina Faso and his recently deceased brother. His brother, however, despite his death, demands attention. The body needs to be recognized before the authorities of an unknown city, the necessary papers need to be taken care of, as do the arrangements to return the body to Burkina Faso: a whole prosaic annex of death with rules that become urgent amidst the mourning. Focusing almost entirely on one character, this singular film reflects on the experience of displacement, as the protagonist sets out on a trip by foot towards an unlikely resolution of his tribulations.” –BAFICI

Thursday, June 5, 7:30pm

THE ABSENT STONE / LA PIEDRA AUSENTE (Sandra Rozental and Jesse Lerner, Mexico/USA, 2013, 82 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)New York Premiere Q&A with co-director Sandra RozentalIn 1964, the largest carved stone of the Americas was moved…

THE ABSENT STONE / LA PIEDRA AUSENTE
(Sandra Rozental and Jesse Lerner, Mexico/USA, 2013, 82 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere
Q&A with co-director Sandra Rozental

In 1964, the largest carved stone of the Americas was moved from the town of San Miguel Coatlinchan in the municipality of Texcoco to the National Anthropology Museum in Mexico City in an impressive feat of engineering. The extraction of the monolith, which represents the pre-Hispanic water deity, set off a rebellion in the town and led to the intervention of the army. Today, the enormous stone, now upright, is an urban monument; it has been transformed into one of the principal icons of Mexican national identity.

The inhabitants of Coatlinchan insist that the removal of the stone has caused droughts. Representations and replicas of the absent stone appear everywhere in Coatlinchan, where it resonates in the memories of the inhabitants. Using animations, archival materials, and contemporary encounters with the protagonists of the transport of the stone, Sandra Rozental and Jesse Lerner’s playful documentary film explores the relevance of the ruins of the past in the present day.

Thursday, May 3, 7:30pm

MY LAST FAILURE / MI ÚLTIMO FRACASO (Cecilia Kang, Argentina, In Spanish with English subtitles, 2016, 61 min.)New York Premiere“There are many films piercing through Cecilia Kang’s first feature; there’s a film about a family (her sister, her mothe…

MY LAST FAILURE / MI ÚLTIMO FRACASO
(Cecilia Kang, Argentina, In Spanish with English subtitles, 2016, 61 min.)

New York Premiere

“There are many films piercing through Cecilia Kang’s first feature; there’s a film about a family (her sister, her mother, her aunt, her grandmother). There’s also one about being an Argentine woman of Korean descent visiting Korea. And another one about being a Korean woman who, at the same time, acts like someone from Buenos Aires. There’s family love, friendship, the small tragedies and the great ones, emancipation, heartbreak, creativity. And none of these storylines drives us to a feeling of drift; they are parts of a mosaic that is pieced together in the viewer’s head thanks to a solid, strongly emotional core: the life of the director, who, in a spontaneous and loving display of generosity, dedicates My Last Failure to (in this order) a teacher from childhood, her eternal friends, and her sister.” —Mar del Plata Film Festival.

Thursday, April 5, 7:30pm

THE HIDDEN TIGER (A Vizinhança do Tigre, Affonso Uchoa, Brazil 2014, 95 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)  New York Premiere Sponsored by the Consulate General of Brazil in New York  Affonso Uchoa made a major critical splash on the festiva…

THE HIDDEN TIGER
(A Vizinhança do Tigre, Affonso Uchoa, Brazil 2014, 95 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)

New York Premiere
Sponsored by the Consulate General of Brazil in New York


Affonso Uchoa made a major critical splash on the festival circuit last spring with his award-winning film, Araby. However, Uchoa has been active as a filmmaker for the past eight years. Made in 2014, The Hidden Tiger charts the lives of a group of young residents of Nacional, a neighborhood in the suburbs of the city of Contagem. Juninho, Menor, Neguinho, Adilson, and Eldo live their lives in dialectical fragments of joy and adversity. Some work in construction, others in drug trafficking; a few attend heavy metal concerts, others play with guns; they read, dance carioca funk, and deal with their families as they struggle with the demands of their daily lives. Music is a key element in Uchoa’s rigorously gentle mise-en-scène—in concert with his patient gaze, it helps to illuminate the faces and bodies of Uchoa’s protagonists. The camera captures and crystallizes moments of small beauty in a landscape of social and economic conflict.

“It is worth noting that, in contrast to the treatment given to pretentiously popular film programs on urban peripheries, here there is no place for demagogy. The film doesn't treat its dwellers as attractions for export, it is an exercise of admirable humanism, nurtured by the five years the director devoted to constructing this admirable fresco.” –André Ldc, Janela Magazine

Monday, March 26, 7:15pm

THE ROMANTIC BARBER (El peluquero romántico, Iván Ávila Dueñas, Mexico/Brazil, 2016, 98 min. In Spanish and Portuguese with English subtitles)New York Premiere  Neighborhood barber Victor’s life is rather uneventful. He sticks to a strict daily rout…

THE ROMANTIC BARBER
(El peluquero romántico, Iván Ávila Dueñas, Mexico/Brazil, 2016, 98 min. In Spanish and Portuguese with English subtitles)

New York Premiere

Neighborhood barber Victor’s life is rather uneventful. He sticks to a strict daily routine at both work and home, where he spends his nights alongside his mother listening to boleros or watching movies from the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema on television. His routine is disrupted when his mother suddenly dies. His flirtation with a young waitress and his reunion with an old girlfriend can’t fill the void left behind by his mother. That changes, however, when a man claiming to be his father suddenly walks into the shop one day. The encounter will lead him to an unexpected and life-changing trip to Rio de Janeiro. The fifth feature by Mexican director Iván Ávila Dueñas, The Romantic Barber is a quirky and charming film about an anachronistic character in a vanishing environment.

Monday, February 26, 7:15pm

THE IDEA OF A LAKE (La idea de un lago, Milagros Mumenthaler, Argentina/Switzerland, 2016, 82 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)  New York Premiere  Based on Guadalupe Gaona’s novel, Pozo de aire, Milagros Mumenthaler’s second feature delves de…

THE IDEA OF A LAKE
(La idea de un lago, Milagros Mumenthaler, Argentina/Switzerland, 2016, 82 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere

Based on Guadalupe Gaona’s novel, Pozo de aire, Milagros Mumenthaler’s second feature delves deeper into the relationship of cinema with loss, memory, and youth. Inés, a photographer, is putting together a book of poems and images about her own past. In doing so, she finds her family dynamics shifting, as she and her mother and brother all come to terms with the absence of her father, who disappeared during the military dictatorship in Argentina. Mumenthaler moves away from the realm of naturalist representation in order to swim into the more obscure waters of artifice. The quest to make present what is absent suffuses the film and establishes Mumenthaler as one of the most interesting voices in contemporary Argentine cinema.

“The film explores the idea of memory on several different levels, and demonstrates how memories can be transformed by things that happen in the present. That’s really the core of the film – the intimate memories that we all have, but also the idea of memory as a civic and political right.” –Milagros Mumenthaler

Monday, January 29, 7:15pm

PLANTS
(Las plantas, Roberto Doveris, Chile, 2015, 93 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

New York Premiere

Roberto Doveris’s debut feature film revolves around Florencia, a 17-year-old girl responsible for the care of her comatose older brother during the summer. Trying to survive with limited means and no assistance, she becomes obsessed with a comic book called “Las Plantas,” which depicts an invasion of earth by sentient plants who take possession of human bodies every full moon. At the same time, Florencia is going through her own sexual awakening, meeting strangers through the internet, and her monotonous daily routine begins to merge with the fantasy world of the comics and her own burgeoning desires. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Film at the Berlinale and associate-produced by Alicia Scherson (The Future, Family Life), Plants is “a sexually souped-up teen psycho-thriller…an original coming-of-age tale laced with pop culture” (Variety).

Thursday, December 14, 7:15pm

PACÍFICO (Fernanda Romandía, Mexico, 2016, 72 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)U.S. Premiere  The building site of Casa Wabi, a house and arts center designed by Japanese architect Tadao Ando among the beaches of Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, serv…

PACÍFICO
(Fernanda Romandía, Mexico, 2016, 72 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)

U.S. Premiere

The building site of Casa Wabi, a house and arts center designed by Japanese architect Tadao Ando among the beaches of Puerto Escondido, Oaxaca, serves as the setting for the story of 7-year-old Coral, who visits the construction site every day after school to spend time with his godfather Diego. In addition to working on the construction crew, Diego is the leader of a musical group, and is addicted to his cellphone. One day, Coral meets Oriente, a carpenter and aspiring poet who dreams of seeing his faraway family again. Growing attached to his new friend, Coral decides he wants Oriente to become a second godfather to him. With exquisite camerawork by Pedro González-Rubio (Alamar) and co-produced by New York-based Mexican artist Bosco Sodi and Carlos Reygadas’s Mantarraya film production company, PACÍFICO is a calm and serene fictional debut, skillfully disguised as a documentary.

“A quiet and modest charmer…small is beautiful in Fernanda Romandía’s docu-fiction hybrid PACÍFICO, which uses the world’s largest geographical feature as backdrop for a delicate wisp of a sun-kissed, seaside tale.” –Neil Young, Hollywood Reporter

Thursday, November 16 at 7:15pm

ABOUT 12 (Juana a los 12, Martín Shanly, Argentina, 2014, 80 min. In English and Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. Premiere Q&A with filmmakerThe problem facing Juana, a 12-year-old girl, is imperceptible to others. She might even be even una…

ABOUT 12
(Juana a los 12, Martín Shanly, Argentina, 2014, 80 min. In English and Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere
Q&A with filmmaker

The problem facing Juana, a 12-year-old girl, is imperceptible to others. She might even be even unaware of it herself, but it is latent in every shot of Martín Shanly’s debut feature: Juana fails easily. She performs poorly at her private British school in the outskirts of Buenos Aires and even worse in her social life among friends and family. About 12 nurtures a rare bitterness in its particular mixture of uncomfortable comedy and tempered tragedy. In the depiction of female bodies out-of-sync with the world they inhabit, Shanly’s film successfully blooms as an odd cousin to Todd Haynes’s Safe and Todd Solondz’s Welcome to the Dollhouse. The lead performance by Rosario Shanly – the director’s sister – transcends masks thanks to a mise-en-scène that manages to be as frail and mysterious as its main character. Juana’s inadequacy to deal with the most basic social rules turns her apparently passive behavior into an intimate revolutionary act, a silent cry of resistance that is both funny and piercing. Juana is a gentle girl, a soul maybe too beautiful for this world.

“It is not a plain attitude that I find in Juana’s character, but a buffoonish darkness whose natural mask is the smile, or simply laughter, usually untimely, that transfigures (and makes much more interesting) the luminosity of her face. A smile that becomes vampiric.” –Nuria Silva, Hacerse la crítica

Thursday, October 12 at 7:15pm

WINTER HOUSE
(Invernadero, Gonzalo Castro, Argentina, 2010, 94 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere
Co-presented by McNally Jackson

“A contemplation of the experimental one-armed Mexican novelist Mario Bellatín, a famed prankster who here engages with his daughter and friends (all fictional characters) in an interrogation of biography (itself a central conceit in Bellatín’s fiction).” —Maria Delgado, Sight & Sound

“Who is Mario Bellatín anyway? A contemporary Mexican novelist, translated all over the world? Captain Hook, and the father of a grown-up daughter? An acupuncture enthusiast? A Muslim who believes in reincarnation? A widow, who isn’t gloomy, but still hasn’t got over it? A robust plant in a winter garden? Answers – Yes, yes, yes – across the board. It is this entangled web of script threads, and more besides, that animates Gonzalo Castro’s film. [...] Bellatín gradually becomes no longer a witness of himself, an author held hostage by his exposed genius, but a character who is above all going about his daily life. That is what is key. A funny, unpredictable character, a dandy without a mirror, except when he shaves with his left hand.” –Jean-Pierre Rehm, FIDMarseille

Thursday, September 28 at 7:15pm

STRANGE DAYS (Días extraños, Juan Sebastián Quebrada, Colombia/Argentina, 2015, b&w, 71 min. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. PremiereJuan and Luna, two young Colombians living in the suburbs of Buenos Aires, are infatuated with each othe…

STRANGE DAYS
(Días extraños, Juan Sebastián Quebrada, Colombia/Argentina, 2015, b&w, 71 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere

Juan and Luna, two young Colombians living in the suburbs of Buenos Aires, are infatuated with each other. Their relationship oscillates between tender gestures and violent explosions. But when Luna meets a woman named Federica and brings her home, something changes, setting into crisis the fragile nature of their relationship. Quebrada’s auspicious debut feature, shot in a stylized black-and-white, was hailed by Sergio Wolf, former director of the Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival (BAFICI) as “one of the best Colombian films in decades.”

Thursday, August 17 at 7:15pm

CARMITA (Laura Amelia Guzmán & Israel Cárdenas, Mexico/Dominican Republic, 2013, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. PremiereThis film tells the story of Carmen Ignarra, the beautiful actress once known as “Cuba’s little princess,” w…

CARMITA
(Laura Amelia Guzmán & Israel Cárdenas, Mexico/Dominican Republic, 2013, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere

This film tells the story of Carmen Ignarra, the beautiful actress once known as “Cuba’s little princess,” who left the Caribbean island in the hopes of becoming a Hollywood star in the early 1950s. Her initial success was followed by a slow, painful decline as her jealous husband – a prominent Mexican producer – curtailed her career. Now 80 years old, Carmita lives forgotten in an old mansion in Monterrey, Mexico. Recounting her life to Guzmán, who is actively present onscreen, she talks about the past, wasted talent, and lost loves. Carmita echoes Sunset Boulevard and Grey Gardens, blurring the faint border between fiction and non-fiction.

Thursday, July 20 at 7:15pm

THE THIRD SIDE OF THE RIVER
(La tercera orilla, Celina Murga, Argentina, 2014, 92 min. digital. In Spanish with English subtitles)
New York Premiere. Filmmaker in Attendance!

This slow-burn drama follows 17-year-old Nicolas, who lives with his mother and younger siblings in a small provincial city in Argentina. His estranged father, Jorge, a respected doctor, has decided that Nicolas will be his successor in both his medical practice and agricultural business. Nicolas obeys his father, but hates him. He has seen his mother suffer because of Jorge’s double life – having started a new family, Jorge refuses to acknowledge Nicolas’s mother or her children publicly. As tensions between father and son grow, Nicolas realizes that he must make a choice and take action for the sake of his future. Executive produced by Martin Scorsese, this fourth feature film by acclaimed Argentinean director Murga premiered in the official competition at the Berlinale.

“[A] beautifully achieved film in which the most important things remain unspoken and placid surfaces belie cauldrons of violent emotion. […] It’s easy to see why Martin Scorsese has taken such a keen interest in Murga’s work. She is, not unlike the young Scorsese himself, very much a ‘neighborhood’ filmmaker, who renders her native milieu – the sleepy provincial towns of Entre Rios, north of Buenos Aires – with an intensely lyrical, sensuous gaze.” –Scott Foundas, Variety.
Thursday, June 29 at 7:15pm

YO (Matías Meyer, Mexico/Canada/Dominican Republic/Switzerland, 2015, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. Premiere. Filmmaker in Attendance!The third feature film by acclaimed Mexican director Matías Meyer (The Last Christeros, The Cramp…

YO
(Matías Meyer, Mexico/Canada/Dominican Republic/Switzerland, 2015, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere. Filmmaker in Attendance!

The third feature film by acclaimed Mexican director Matías Meyer (The Last Christeros, The Cramp) is an adaptation of a short story of the same name by Nobel laureate author J. M. G. Le Clézio. The film follows Yo, a teenager in the body of an adult with an apparent mental incapacity. He lives and works at his mother’s roadside café by a busy highway. One day he meets Elena, an eleven-year-old girl, who will change his life forever. Winner of the Best Film award at the Morelia Film Festival and a Special Mention at the Fribourg Film Festival, Yo is an intriguing mediation on the epic human journey of emotional maturation.

Saturday, May 27 at 7:15pm


LA MALDAD (Joshua Gil, Mexico, 2015, 74 min, digital. In Spanish with English subtitles) U.S. Premiere. Filmmaker in Attendance!As an act of revenge against the woman who abandoned him and as a way to exorcise his own demons, the rural poet and musi…

LA MALDAD
(Joshua Gil, Mexico, 2015, 74 min, digital. In Spanish with English subtitles)
U.S. Premiere. Filmmaker in Attendance!

As an act of revenge against the woman who abandoned him and as a way to exorcise his own demons, the rural poet and musician Rafael writes a screenplay in which, by means of twelve songs, he narrates the story of his own life. Raymundo, on the other hand, is a tired, depressed, and potentially suicidal man who approaches Rafael seeking financial support and solace. But Rafael, blinded by his ambition, betrays him in more ways than one, and travels to Mexico City in search of funds to produce his film. A playful and self-reflexive tale, La Maldad's intriguing and captivating atmosphere reveals the desolation that overwhelms its protagonists.

La Maldad marks a promising if enigmatic feature debut from cinematographer turned director Joshua Gil. […] The movie works best as an abstract contemplation on life, death and the passing of time, recalling the more conceptual work of fellow Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas.” –Jordan Mintzer, The Hollywood Reporter

Saturday, April 22 at 5:30pm

 

January — March, 2017

VERANO
(José Luis Torres Leiva, Chile, 2011, 93 min, digital. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)

The second fiction feature by José Luis Torres Leiva, one of the leading Chilean filmmakers of his generation whose work has had very limited exposure in the U.S. Verano is a choral drama set on a hot summer day in the south of Chile, where small events shape the lives of visitors and employees of an established thermal resort. A dozen characters experience the long vacation hours in nature – sleeping in the sun, learning how to drive, cleaning the house, kissing for the first time, swimming at night, or just walking and talking, while the day slowly unravels into small fragments of happiness and discovery. The cast includes Argentinean actress/singer Rosario Bléfari (who played the title role in Martín Rejtman’s Silvia Prieto), and Chilean documentary filmmaker Ignacio Agüero.

Thursday, March 23 at 7:15pm

MAURO (Hernán Rosselli, Argentina, 2014, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)Hernán Rosselli’s auspicious debut feature film, a winner at the Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival (BAFICI), is a sharp character study follow…

MAURO
(Hernán Rosselli, Argentina, 2014, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)

Hernán Rosselli’s auspicious debut feature film, a winner at the Buenos Aires Independent Film Festival (BAFICI), is a sharp character study following Mauro (played by Mauro Martínez), a metalworker who moonlights as a currency forger trading fake bills in the streets of Buenos Aires. He decides to set up a little printing shop with his roommate Luis and Luis’s pregnant girlfriend to produce counterfeit money. Yet things get complicated when he falls for the mysterious Paula.

“An engrossing X-ray of life in a southern barrio of Buenos Aires that doubles as a study of a society in crisis, Mauro ripples with quiet virtues. First-timer Rosselli has brought to his debut feature the same precision and craft as his troubled protagonist brings to his forgery, and the result is a slow-burning, intense item that exists somewhere on the increasingly blurred line between feature and documentary, harking back to established films such as Pablo Trapero’s Crane World and, indeed, to the Romanian New Wave in its dark, focused gaze and its unpatronizing treatment of social issues.” –Jonathan Holland, The Hollywood Reporter.

Thursday, February 16, 7:15pm — Q&A with filmmaker

NAVAJAZO (Ricardo Silva, Mexico, 2014, 75 min. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)Winner of the Golden Leopard for Best Film in the Cineasti del Presente (Filmmakers of the Present) competition at the Locarno Film Festival, Ricardo…

NAVAJAZO
(Ricardo Silva, Mexico, 2014, 75 min. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)

Winner of the Golden Leopard for Best Film in the Cineasti del Presente (Filmmakers of the Present) competition at the Locarno Film Festival, Ricardo Silva’s provocative and irreverent debut feature film is a quirky fiction-documentary hybrid set in the border city of Tijuana, where a series of peculiar outcasts (a junkie couple, a musician nicknamed “El Muerto,” and an American porn director, among others) struggle to survive in a hostile post-apocalyptic environment filled with drugs, sex, and violence. “Utterly mesmerizing in its perversion” (James Lattimer, Slant Magazine), Navajazo (which means “knife wound” in Spanish) confirms Silva as a filmmaker to watch, and Tijuana as an unlikely Mexican art scene.

Thursday, January 19, 7:15pm