24th Annual Havana Film Festival New York
April 12-18, 2024
Aiming to enrich and expand the vision of Latin American culture in the United States and its effects on global filmmaking, this year's program includes multiple New York, US, and world premieres of contemporary cinema from the region, award-winning documentaries that explore iconic Latin American literary, cinematic, and musical figures; and retrospectives of remastered classic films that have left an indelible mark on cinematic production around the world.
All screenings (except as noted) at:
Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th St, New York City
For tickets and more information visit: https://www.hffny.com/
Havana Star Prize Competition — Fiction:
I WOKE UP WITH A DREAM / DESPERTÉ CON UN SUEÑO
(Pablo Solarz, Argentina/Uruguay, 2023, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
Felipe is a teenager who spends his days riding a bike with friends along the empty streets of the beach town where they live, rapping freestyle and taking acting classes behind his mother’s back. Faced with the chance to audition for a film, he escapes to the capital city and meets his paternal grandmother after not seeing her since his father’s death, and puts together the pieces of his past.
TOLL / PEDÁGIO
(Carolina Markowicz, Brazil/Portugal, 2023, 102 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)
Suellen, a Brazilian toll booth attendant and mother, falls in with a gang of thieves in an attempt to keep her family afloat. In doing so, she realizes she can use her job to raise some extra money illegally for a so-called noble cause: to send her son to an expensive gay conversion workshop led by a renowned foreign priest. But she unwittingly triggers a chain of events that will leave no one happy, except maybe the thieves.
MEMENTO MORI
(Fernando López Cardona, Colombia/Germany, 2023, 112 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
A man's decapitated body is buried unnamed in Puerto Berrio. It’s a corpse attributed to war; thus everybody avoids its tomb. At the funeral, a stranger writes "chosen" on the coffin, sealing a pact to retrieve the missing head and restore the man's dignity.
REBELLION / REBELIÓN
(José Luis Rugeles, Colombia/Argentina/USA, 2023, 105 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
An intimate portrait of the life of Colombian singer-songwriter Joe Arroyo that dives deep into his passions, genius and excesses.
LAZARO’S DAUGHTER / LA HIJA DE LÁZARO
(Gustavo Fallas, Costa Rica/Spain, 2023, 90 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
Costa Rican journalist Ana Casasola investigates her father's death in a terrorist attack. Following a potential witness, Ana travels to the location near the Nicaraguan border. There, she discovers personal significance in this mysterious man.
UNDER A POWERFUL SUN / BAJO UN SOL PODEROSO
(Enrique ‘Kiki’ Álvarez, Cuba, 2022, 87 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
A Cuban filmmaker locks himself in his house to confront his loneliness and the ghosts of the couples who starred in three of his films made over 31 years, from the fall of the Berlin Wall until today. An essay on loneliness, absence, restlessness, and the weight of social circumstances on individuals. A film about Havana, filmed in Havana, lived in Havana, under a powerful sun.
WILD WOMAN / LA MUJER SALVAJE
(Alán González, Cuba, 2023, 93 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
In a Havana slum, a woman survives a bloody fight between her husband and her lover. In a desperate attempt to spare her son from the scandal, she decides to run away with him, but a video of the incident has already gone viral.
A NIGHT WITH THE ROLLING STONES / UNA NOCHE CON LOS ROLLING STONES
(Patricia Ramos, Cuba/Nicaragua, 2023, 92 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
Rita, in the midst of a midlife crisis, decides to end a relationship that’s been going nowhere and embark on a quest for new love in the days leading up to the historic concert of The Rolling Stones in Havana.
THE MONROY AFFAIRE / EL CASO MONROY
(Josué Mendez, Peru/Argentina, 2023, 95 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
Ronnie Monroy, about to turn 65 and face retirement, discovers the Women's Prison, where he finds a new purpose. He helps inmates recover their freedom and start life anew. But what seems driven by generosity and affection, is really guided by a perverse need to exert power.
HEROIC / HEROICO
(David Zonana, Mexico/Sweden, 2023, 88 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Luis, an 18-year-old boy with Indigenous roots, enters the Heroic Military College in hopes of ensuring a better future. There, he encounters a rigid and institutionally violent system designed to turn him into a perfect soldier.
Havana Star Prize Competition — Documentary:
AYAHUASCA NOW
(Carlos Bruno Cejas, Argentina, 2024, 90 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
A group of US veterans, affected by the traumas of war, travel to the Peruvian Amazon seeking redemption. Their tales shed light on soldiers' mental battles, voicing the daily struggle to heal the invisible wounds of war.
LANDRIÁN
(Ernesto Daranas Serrano, Cuba/Spain, 2023, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
An approach to the life and work of Nicolás Guillén Landrián (1938-2003), Cuba’s first black filmmaker, whose avant-garde films were censored, while he was subjected to imprisonment, psychiatric internment and finally exile.
TITO, MARGOT & ME / TITO, MARGOT Y YO
(Mercedes Arias and Delfina Vidal, Panama/Colombia, 2022, 92 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with directors
A cinematic portrait of the larger-than-life love affair of Panamanian diplomat Tito Arias and his wife, famous dancer Dame Margot Fonteyn, that weaves together interviews, found footage, letters, old photographs, and emotive dance sequences.
ALDO BALDIN: A LIFE FOR MUSIC / ALDO BALDIN: UMA VIDA PELA MÚSICA
(Yves Goulart, Brazil, 2024, 114 min. In Portuguese with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director and producer Marcelo Nigri
Aldo Baldin - A Life for Music is an operatic documentary that unfolds talented tenor Aldo Baldin as he journeyed from humble beginnings in Brazil to international recognition in Europe. Baldin was among the finest tenors in the world during the 1980’s, particularly as an interpreter of Bach's pieces. He worked with conductors such as Sir Neville Marriner, Helmuth Rilling, Herbert von Karajan, Rolf Beck, Karl Richter and Peter Schreier. With longing stories from a wide range of musicians, friends and family members, Aldo Baldin – A Life for Music celebrates the unique career of this artist and professor, as one of the greatest classical musicians from Brazil.
WE, THE WOMEN / NOSOTRAS
(Emilce Quevedo Díaz, Colombia, 2023, 70 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
Through three generations of women in her family, the director reflects on the joys of women’s bonds and resilience but also on the devastating impact of traditional gender roles, gender violence and the suffocating weight of religion.
THE CASTLE / EL CASTILLO
(Martin Benchimol, Argentina, 2023, 80 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Having worked as a housekeeper all her life, Justina inherits from her former employer a mansion in the middle of the Argentinean pampas. Under one condition: she must never leave. In this modern fairytale, Justina and her daughter will face the challenges of keeping that promise alive.
BLESSED SONG / SANTA CANCIÓN
(Juan Carlos Travieso Fajardo, Cuba, 2023, 71 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
*Q&A with director
In Cuba, there is a magical city intoxicated with lights, legends, and songs. The Longina Troubadours Meeting was born there, bringing together the youngest figures of the singer/song-writer genre. This documentary explores the movement's past, present, and future.
TRANSFARIANA
(Joris Lachaise, Colombia/France, 2023, 100 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
In a high-security prison south of Bogotá, the marriage of a FARC leader to a former transgender sex worker first caused a scandal and then led to a shift in opinion. The film seeks the signs that precede the changes in society.
