2005 FILM LISTINGS

MACHUCA

CHILE, SPAIN, FRANCE, 2004
Director: Andrés Wood
Drama, 120 minutes

After directing some of the most engaging –and best shot- Chilean films of the past seven years, (REVENGE and SOCCER STORIES) Andres Wood returns here with a poignant story based on his own childhood experiences.
It is the Chile of 1973, a country in turmoil just about to be shattered by political revolution. In the country’s capital city of Santiago, Gonzalo Infante and Pedro Machuca, two 11-year old boys who will become aquainted, breath very different lives. Gonzalo lives in a comfortable middle to upper class neighborhood and Pedro Machuca in an illegal shantytown at the banks of the Mapocho river a few blocks away from a Catholic private school.
Father McEnroe, the headmaster at the school, with parental support, admits children from the shantytown families into his prestigious school. Gonzalo and Pedro become classmates and friends. Plainly the two friends, along with Pedro’s pretty cousin Silvana, would never have met had it not been for their progressive private school, run by the left-leaning American priest. The youngsters play together, traveling between their two social worlds, blissfully unaware of the situation that is dangerously fermenting in their country. As the bloody coup unfolds and the repressive military junta takes over, the children’s lives are forever changed.
“It was a short period of time”- director Wood has said in interviews- “that left its mark on us all, both rich and poor. Two worlds were brought together that had been separate throughout the entire history of Chile.”
Far from being overly melodramatic, the film lovingly re-creates the Chile of the 1970s in a simultaneously funny, passionate and ultimately heartbreaking coming-of-age drama.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Gonzalo Infante (Matías Quer), Pedro Machuca (Ariel Mateluna), Silvana (Manuela Martelli) - Aline Küppenheim, Ernesto Malbran, Tamara Acosta, Francisco Reyes, Alejandro Trejo, Federico Luppi.

AWARDS: Chile's Official entry for Best Foreign Language Film, Academy Awards 2004. - Best Feature Film, Audience Award, Philadelphia Film Festival 2005 – Best Latin American Feature Film, Mexico City Int. Contemporary Film Festival 2005 – Nominated for the Goya Prize (Spain), as Best Spanish Language Foreign Film, 2005 – Most Popular Film, Vancouver Int. Film Festival 2004. – Grand Poa Award, Director Andres Wood, Viña del Mar Film Festival 2004.– Best Film, Valdivia Int. Film Festival 2004. – Best Film, Golden Precolumbian Circle, Bogotá Film Festival 2004.

AROUND FLAMENCO

SPAIN, 2003
Director: Paco Millán
Feature Doc, 93 minutes
In English with Spanish subtitles


If you can imagine a professional Japanese dancer in love with Flamenco and communicating the excitement to a new generation of admirers in Japan, you get the idea of the passion the dance engenders. For, as this film demonstrates, this is not just a dance, but also an enchantment that can change your life. At least that’s how gypsies, who breathe and live this dance, give themselves up it, letting it go to the core of their souls.
While targeted at all audiences, in the opinion of Paco Millán, the film's director and producer, "Around Flamenco' " is aimed especially at Spaniards to witness the love abroad for flamenco, a universal phenomenon whose value they should appreciate. I had to live it to understand it and I tell the story my way: cinematographically".
The film focuses on a characterful family troupe, which having gone thousands of miles away from their homes, have made Flamenco the center of their lives with a passion that overrides distances. In this varied gallery of human beings we find the stories of those who renounced a vocation, a position or security in general, for an irresistible attraction to an ancient culture that dates back to its origins in India.
Shot around New York, Paris, Tokyo, Madrid and Granada, the film also deals with the young American, French and Japanese dancers' approach to this dance and how the Flamenco phenomenon is taking hold of cultures, previously considered too distant and unreachable to seduce.
There are some who invented a new identity to make themselves Andalusian gypsies, and those who travel across continents to make their dreams come true. And in this regard the film touches upon an unspoken question: will Flamenco be enriched or altered by the inevitably different character of those who take up its challenge?

CAPTAINS OF APRIL/CAPITAES DE ABRIL

PORTUGAL/FRANCE, 2001
Director: Maria de Medeiros
Drama, 124 minutes

With an auspicious launch as one of the 'Official Selections' at the Cannes Film Festival, 2001, the film is one of the most expensive ever made in Portugal.
No Portuguese will ever forget the night of 24th of April and the dawn of the 25th, 1974 in Lisbon. A simple, or perhaps not that simple song, starts a military coup that will change the state of the country and the destiny of the territories that Portugal still hold in Africa.
To the sounds of “Grandola Vila Morena”, sung by poet Zeca Afonso, mutinous troops take over the military barracks. It is a dangerous move that could spark a civil war, but this revolution rapidly takes a different route. Portuguese actress Maria de Medeiros, ambitiously directing her first film, focuses on a more human, subtle, almost bloodless revolution. The film dynamically follows a number of characters: civilians and soldiers, caught up in the monumental sweep of events. Propelled by widespread popular support, the coup, known also as the “Revolution of Carnations” (since an anonymous woman spontaneously placed a carnation inside the gun of a soldier ready to shoot,) was initiated by two young army captains. They were part of a small band of junior officers, the April Captains of the film’s title. And they succeeded in overturning the dictatorship of Marcelo Caetano, who followed the same policy line as Antonio Salazar’s lengthy regime. Medeiros herself plays Antonia, a militant teacher outraged when one of her students is tortured by the secret police. Stefano Accorsi is Maia, a provincial army captain who catches the mood of the times and attempts to persuade his soldiers to join the rebellion in Lisbon. Joaquim de Almeida, the popular Portuguese actor, plays Gervasio. Actress-director Medeiros beautifully orchestrates the enthusiasm and drama of the events through the eyes of young and old. These were the events that lead Portugal to sever its ties with its colonial past and launched the country into a closer relationship with the European Community.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Stefano Accorsi (Maia) - Maria de Medeiros (Antonia), Joaquim de Almeida (Gervasio), Frédéric Pierrot (Manuel) – Fele Martinez (Lobão) – Manuel João Vieira (Fonseca) – Marcantonio Del Carlo (Silva)

ROMA

SPAIN/ARGENTINA, 2004
Director: Adolfo Aristarain
Drama, 153 minutes

Director Aristarain gets close to the bone, to the 60’s and 70’s mood in the world and Buenos Aires in particular in ROMA, where the placid structures of daily life have begun to shake.
When young journalist Manuel is hired by the publishers of “a has been successful writer” - aging novelist Joaquin Goñez - to help produce his autobiography, the writer Goñez slowly starts to uncover a bridge to the forgotten times of his youth. After years of self expatriation, Joaquin has now a “practical” reason – he will be paid good money - to recall his childhood and his days in the Buenos Aires of the 60’s and 70’s. But the trip to the past has its own surprises. The mistakes made in the passage to adulthood, the memories of old friends, the meaning of political loyalty, the influences of cinema and jazz, and the taste of the first love. Memories of his youth bring back images of the sudden loss of his father and above all memories of his mother Roma (played by Susú Pecoraro, well remembered for her leading role in Bemberg's film CAMILA,) who was the constant supporter of his early ideals. Roma is an intelligent brave woman who calmly anticipated her only son's creative personality. And it is through going back to his past, helped by Manuel's questions, that the writer will discover his mother's influence and his desire to reclaim all that for so long he believed lost.
If all “serious” literary fiction is essentially autobiographical, the same can be said of what the French call “film de auteur”, which is what director Adolfo Aristarain has been making over the past few years. But this is just anecdotal because what any viewer is most interested in is in just seeing a good film. With “ROMA” these expectations will be amply satisfied. The film will have a broad appeal, but it will especially appeal to anyone who lived through that era, and it should be a MUST, actually a DUTY, if you’re South American –not to mention porteño (from Buenos Aires.)

PRINCIPAL CAST: Juan Diego Botto (Manuel) – Susú Percoraro (Roma) – José Sacristán (Joaquín Goñez) – Carla Crespo – Agustín Garvie – Vando Villamil – Marcela Kloosterboer – Marina Glezer – Gustavo Garzón

AWARDS: Best Film, Best Director, Best Actress (Susú Pecoraro) at 53rd Annual Condor de Plata 2005 Awards, Film Critics of Argentina; Best Screenplay, Best Actress (Susú Pecoraro) at 26th Edition of New Latin American International Film Festival of La Havana, Cuba 2004; Best Actress (Susú Pecoraro) at the Clarín Awards, 2005, Jury formed by 450 journalists and show-business people in Buenos Aires; Best Actress (Susú Pecoraro) at the National Film Festival, Tandil, Argentina, 2004.

EL CARRO/THE CAR

COLOMBIA, 2003
Director: Luis Orjuela
Comedy, 93 minutes

Yes, despite the on going war in Colombia, there is fun and humor in their local film industry. In this popular film – this is the third screening in Toronto - a lower middle class family is introduced to the “material world” and its dangers.
Paula, the youngest daughter of the Velez family, narrates her family’s infatuation with their first car: a red-hot 50’s Chevy that threatens to change everything.
This peaceful family with its excitable members will taste the future when the know-all father, after doing complicated numbers decides he can afford to buy his neighbor’s car. This sporty old car practically becomes a member of the family, and the emotional landscape also changes. The teenage son sees it as a babe-magnet, the family patriarch gains self-confidence and the sudden interest of a curvaceous neighbor, and the mother receives some added sparks to her romantic dreams. Despite its constant breakdowns, the car serves as both catalyst and witness to each family member's development. The film is a relentless, well observed comedy of situations conducted with a firm hand by Colombian debutante director Luis Orjuela.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Cesar Badillo, Luly Bossa, Zaira Valenzuela, Diego Cadavid, Elkin Diaz, Fernando Garcia, Claudia Lozano, Ana Maria Sanchez, Fernando Solorzano

PATORUZITO

ARGENTINA, 2004
Director: José Luis Massa
Feature Cartoon, 74 minutes
Adventures, humor

Patoruzito is probably the best-known character in the history of comic strips in Argentina. The adventures of the little Indian were a weekly feast for millions of children and youngsters. When some of the most talented group of animators and artists in Buenos Aires took the characters to the screen for the first time ever, there were more than 2 million spectators in the first few weeks.
Inspired by the characters created by Dante Quinterno, the story starts when the Patoruzek tribe decides to settle in a far-off kingdom in Patagonia. And the story continues much later when the valiant Patoruzito, a boy with as big a heart as his strength, must prove himself worthy to be crowned Chief.
Accompanied by his faithful pal, the bronco Pamperito and his funny god-father Isidorito, our little hero takes on incredible adventures in which dangers of all kind test him. With courage and wisdom, Patoruzito proves that a good heart is more powerful than any weapon.

Suitable for children of all ages.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Patoruzito, Isidorito, Pamperito, Patoruzú and family.

SECTION JEWELS

AHI ESTA EL DETALLE
-CANTINFLAS-

MEXICO, 1940
Director: Juan Bustillo Oro
Comedy, 104 minutes
DVD – B & W -

NOTICE:
This film does not have English subtitles

If this film doesn’t have English subtitles, or in any other language for that matter, it is because it’s impossible to translate the Cantinflas humor which is quintessentially verbal. We wouldn’t recommend this film to anyone who doesn’t have a good command of Spanish. His smart pyrotechnical language has become what people in Mexico now call “a Cantinflada”, long winded without really saying anything. The film opened in 1940 to great success in Latin America and Spain and established Cantinflas as a major comic star.
In this early and memorable comedy of errors, Cantinflas plays a bum who pretends to be the brother of a wealthy lady. He goes from being a maid’s boyfriend, to the master of the house, without anyone suspecting foul play. But when the heir to the fortune shows up, the deception becomes ever harder to maintain.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Cantinflas, Sofía Alvarez, Joaquín Pardave, Sara García, Agustín Sunza

SECTION JEWELS

A MAN AND A WOMAN

FRANCE, 1966
Director: Claude Lelouch
Romance, 100 minutes
French with English subtitles

There is a younger generation of film lovers in Toronto who have heard many times, probably from their parents, how wonderful a film A Man And A Woman was. We would like to say: how wonderful a film IS!!! Because any film that surpasses the test of time with such ease –in this case, 40 years- should merit the title of 'jewel.' That’s why we’ve selected it for this section. The production feels and looks like it was shot a few months ago. But it has an aura of romanticism at a time when many social structures began to break down. Let’s not forget that it was shot in the middle of the 60’s when the “hippies” were in full swing. But strangely, this is a side step to the tune of the moment. A story between two responsible adults with their respective lives in full order. Or so it seemed.
The film made the audience take notice of the value of silences, realistic dialogues, humor, music, climatic and exciting photography used with economy and flair. But to say that the film is about a widowed race driver with a young son and a lonely woman with a young daughter would not be fair. To say much more than that would spoil it. What we could say though, according to one of the film's promotional tags, is that the film really became “the famous French love affair that the world took to heart.”

PRINCIPAL CAST: Jean-Louis Trintignant (Jean-Louis Duroc) - Anouk Aimée (Anne Gauthier) –Pierre Barouh (Pierre Gauthier) – Valerie Lagrange (Valerie Duroc) – Antoine Sire (Antoine Duroc) – Souad Amidou (Francoise Gauthier) – Henri Chemin (Jean-Louis’s co-driver) – Yanne Barry (Jean-Louis lover)

AWARDS: Oscar, Best Foreign Language Film, 1966 – Best Screenplay & Best writing for the screen to Claude Lelouch and Pierre Uytterhoeven, Academy Awards Oscars, 1966 – Golden Palm Award, Claude Lelouch, Cannes Film Festival 1966, (tied with Signore & Signore (Italy) -Blue Ribbon Award for Best Foreign Film to Claude Lelouch, 1967 - Best Foreign Film, Cinema writers Circle Awards, Spain, 1967 – Best Foreign Film, Golden Globe, USA, and Best Motion Picture Actress, Anouk Aimée, 1967 – Best Original music and song for a Motion Picture to Francis Lai and Pierre Barouh (lyrics) Song: A man and a woman. – Silver Ribbon Award for Best Director and Best Foreign Film, Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists, 1967 - Best Foreign Actress, Anouk Aimée, BAFTA Film Awards, 1968

NAZI GOLD IN ARGENTINA

ARGENTINA, 2004
Director: Rolo Pereyra
Feature Documentary, 90 minutes

Shot in Argentina, Switzerland, Spain, Germany and Italy, this feature documentary uncovers controversial evidence about the arrival in Argentina of Nazi war criminals along with their great fortunes.
By means of unprecedented testimonies, carefully produced re-enactments and the expertise of world renowned researchers, it sheds light upon the darkest era of Nazism.
Director Pereyra, who died last year, and Jorge Camarasa, author of the book Odessa Al Sur/Odessa To The South on the same subject, followed a complicated money trail. Through testimonies they managed to get a politico-social portrait of how Argentina was more than 60 years ago.
The story begins in Patagonia, in the deep south of Argentina, where investigators seek for the remains of a German U boat landing.
This search leads them back in time to Argentina in the 1930’s, before the Second World War, when huge amounts of money were transferred to the country to be used for espionage and propaganda. Colonel Perón's friendship with a powerful banker, who played a crucial role in the transfer of funds to Argentina, was jeopardized by the detention of a man Perón sent to make a pact with the Third Reich. Once the war was over, Perón appointed this banker’s son as his private secretary during his three Presidencies.
A net of connections is set up around Perón. Criminals like Eichmann, Menguele and Priebke are summoned. A German captain directs a mysterious office in Bern, Switzerland. He arranges the transferral of huge wealth and helped the most wanted nazi war criminals escape to Argentina. The trails of crimes and money are merged and blurred into the country's daily life. A former Third Reich financier starts a systematic plan to destroy evidence, and after Peron’s fall, he manages to establish himself at the top of Argentine and international economical power.
The expertise of researchers such as Jean Ziegler, Uki Goni, Beatriz Gurevich and Matteo San Filippo among others, is crucial in the investigation. The ordeal of victims and survivors collide with the shocking statements made by Wilfred von Oven , Goebbel’s former secretary, and by Erich Priebke’ son. The story has been kept secret…till today.

THE LAST MOON/LA ULTIMA LUNA

CHILE, 2005
Director: Miguel Littín
Drama, 105 minutes

Language: Arab and Hebrew with subtitles

Set in Palestine 1914, this film tells the remarkable story of Soliman, a young Palestinian, and Jacob, his Jewish friend who started to build a house in the hills of Judea. It is also about two Palestinian families, one that migrates to Chile and one that stays in Palestine. Filmed on location on the West Bank, in Bethlehem, Jerusalem and the Dead Sea, the film goes deep into the notions of place and belonging while chronicling a fascinating period in history marked by mounting tensions between Palestinians and Jewish families. Twice Oscar-nominated director Miguel Littín is one of Latin America's foremost filmmakers. He has made numerous films, including El Chacal de Nahueltoro (1969), Sandino (1995), A Palestinian Chronicle (2001) and Tierra del Fuego (2000).  

Journalist Jennifer Green reports:

“The Chilean director had to dodge bullets to return to his Palestinian roots.
Director Miguel Littín swears that he is not attracted to shooting in dangerous locations. They just happen to be where he finds the best stories. “The themes I am interested in are related to these situations. You can’t tell an Israeli-Palestinian story without being in a danger zone“ he says of LA ULTIMA LUNA/THE LAST MOON.
The film was shot with great difficulty in Palestinian territories, but the once-exiled director is perhaps best known for sneaking back to Pinochet’s Chile in 1985 to make the clandestine documentary Acta General de Chile. Garcia Marquez wrote a book about that.
Littin escaped Chile following the military coup in 1973, having been appointed as head of the nation’s film institute by Salvador Allende two years earlier. He lived for many years in exile in Mexico. But the director also had personal reasons for making THE LAST MOON. Littín recalls growing up in Chile, home to one of the largest Palestinian diaspors in the world, “hearing stories of how my grandfather left Palestine in 1914”. The director first traveled to the region in the 1980’s and found long-lost relatives whose life stories impressed him greatly. In 2001 he shot CRONICAS PALESTINAS a documentary which paved the way for this new film.
Ignoring recommendations to shoot in Morocco instead, Littin says he and his mostly under-30 crew, including his son Miguel Joan Littin as cinematographer, endured hassles from gun-toting soldiers and long delays. “You can’t make plans because the possibilities change daily. There are military checkpoints everywhere. It was constantly dangerous, with shots ringing out and helicopters overhead. We sometimes had to go long hours with no food or even water.“ But the locals were extremely helpful. “My art director was desperate because nothing of the past remains. We had no wardrobe, but people on the street would offer us their things –they save clothes and other effects from their grandparents.”
Littin insists THE LAST MOON is a tale of optimism. “Palestinians are surrounded by nine-meter walls; they’re on an island too. It is a metaphor of life. Even though we live in a world of cynicism and bombings, we keep on going, we wake up every day with our hopes and our joys.”

PRINCIPAL CAST: Alejandro Goic (Jacobeo) - Ayman Abu Alzulof (Soliman) – Tamara Acosta (Matty) – Francisca Merino (Alinne) – Saba Musleh (Safir) – Milad Zighari (Maihail) – Mahmoud Awad (Gorbacha) – Nicola Zreineh (Janos) Tania Shomali (Azur)

AWARDS: Best Director, Hispanic American Film Festival of Santa Cruz, Bolivia, 2005 – Best Photography, Hispanic American Film Festival of Guadalajara, Mexico, 2005 – Official Selection, Moscow International Film Festival, 2005

TRAVELLING WITH CHE GUEVARA

ITALY, 2004
Director: Gianni Minà
Feature Doc, 100 minutes
English and Spanish with subtitles

This is a documentary about the making of Walter Salles' movie Motorcycle Diaries, made by renowned Italian journalist and filmmaker Gianni Minà.
In 1952 Ernesto Che Guevara, a 23 year-old medical student, wrote a diary during his travels in Latin America with his friend Alberto Granado, a 29-year -old biologist and researcher.
The six months journey was filled with adventures and life experiences while crossing Argentina, Chile, Peru, Columbia and Venezuela.
Ernesto and Alberto started out on an old "Norton 500" bike and ended up hitch-hiking. The two friends returned from this voyage transformed; their encounter with the misery and degradation affecting most of the people of Latin America, and in particular their experience working in a Peruvian leper colony changed them forever.
In 2002, Walter Salles decided to film this story. The result was "The
Motorcycle Diaries", produced by Robert Redford and Michael Nozik. Gianni Minà, the Guevara's family and Alberto Granado's representative, collaborated on the script. It was during this collaboration that he decided to direct "Travelling with Che Guevara". He invited Alberto Granado, the surviving member of the journey, to follow the movie's shooting and meet the cast to bring the adventure to life on screen.
Some fifty-years later Granado retraces his fascinating journey. Now 82, he lives in Cuba having answered the call of Che Guevara after the Cuban revolution's victory. The documentary aimed to chronicle Granado's memories and impressions interspersing them with scenes from the movie and sequences shot behind the scenes. The actor who plays Granado in the movie is Rodrigo De La Serna, an Argentinian and distant relation of Ernesto Guevara's mother.  Che is played by Gael Garcia Bernal, the Mexican actor who triumphed in AMORES PERROS. The actors relied on Granado's reminiscences to shape their parts. Their behind the scene inquiries and discussions provided invaluable material for this unique documentary.

AWARDS: Golden Zenith (Zenith D’Or) Festival Des Films Du Monde, Montreal, 2004 – Flaiano International Award, Golden Pegaso (Pegaso D’Oro) 2004, Italian Film Critics' Nastro D’Argento, 2004.

A RED BEAR/UN OSO ROJO

ARGENTINA, 2003
Director: Adrián Caetano
Thriller, Drama, 94 minutes

Although Bear is the only one counting, seven years have gone by since he was sent to prison for robbery and murder. He's unpredictable and violent by nature, but he holds his past close to his chest and with simmering intensity. The day of the robbery was his daughter's Alicia first birthday and his wife Natalia has never forgiven him for that. Now, as he is paroled, Bear thinks he might be able to start anew – but many things have changed. Natalia lives with Sergio, who stood by her during rough times, and Alicia barely remembers her father. Bear is determined to get them back or at least repair the damage. As in a disenchanted urban western, A RED BEAR draws out the destiny of a justice-seeking avenger, outlawed by the rawness of life in the suburbs of Buenos Aires. As with his previous film, BOLIVIA, Caetano's latest film won international acclaim in prestigious festivals such as Cannes, Sundance and New Directors/New Films in New York; and in Argentina, the film is considered to be one the finest examples of the "New Argentine Cinema."

PRINCIPAL CAST: Julio Chávez (Oso) – Soledad Villamil (Natalia) – Agostina Lage (Alicia) – Luis Machin – Enrique Liporace

PRESS CLIPS:
“It’s combination of toughness and smooth understated style makes it touching and absorbing"

– A. O. Scott, New York Times

"Once again, Adrián Caetano, confirms that he is one of the best Argentine directors of the last years, and yet he is able to give a new twist to his work"

– Josefina Santoro, Cineismo.com

"A Red Bear imposes itself as a piece of great dramatic power that ratifies a prolific director's narrative talent"

– Diego Batlle, La Nación

AWARDS: Silver Condor Award at the Argentinian Film Critics' Association Awards 2003 - Special Jury Prize, Best Music and Special Mention Award at the Havana Film Festival 2002.

DREAMING OF SAO PAULO

BRAZIL/FRANCE, 2004
Co-directed: Jean Pierre Duret & Andréa Santana
Feature Documentary, 100 minutes
Portuguese with English subtitles

For decades now, and driven by a ferocious will to survive, the peasants of northeast Brazil have migrated to Sao Paulo: an illusory city that all poverty stricken people see giving them enough food to feed their families, and a way of being seen as 'someone’.
Such a hard life in such a splendid landscape. Such incredible skies high above the trees and such drama below. We witness a man walking into a lagoon to fish. His only tools are a net and a rubber tire. « I am sad » he says, « I can’t bear seeing my children suffer. Many times they go to school without eating. I work hard but that’s not enough. A rich man once told me : I’d like to be poor for five minutes to experience a poor man’s life. But I say, only the poor can really know."
In a revealing scene, a family of struggling farmers, whose children have all left for a better life in Sao Paulo, watch recently elected President of Brazil, Luis Inacio da Silva or Lula, give an emotional speech on television, recalling his poor childhood. This was January of 2003. It is ironic, considering all the corruption scandals in the Brazilian government, to see it now.
Filmmakers Jean-Pierre Duret and Andréa Santana travelled with 18-year old José, 3,000 km from his birthplace to Sao Paulo, that magic lantern of a city, which in its 'whale's belly' contains over 8 million northeasterners. His dream and that of all those they passed on the trip give this film its structure and its soul. Faced with chaos around them, the only hope they can cling to, is the will to survive.
An amazing tough and beautiful documentary about dignity, belonging and the drama of uprooting.

1809-1810-AS THE DAY ARRIVES/
"1809-1910- MIENTRAS LLEGA EL DIA”

ECUADOR, 2004
Director: Camilo Luzuriaga
Drama, 100 minutes

It is not frequent that we are able to see films, let alone good films, from Ecuador. The country has practically no means, or the will to take charge and invest in “national culture”.
So what director Camilo Luzuriaga has done here is doubly meritorious. Almost single handedly he has invested his own money, got others to invest, and then produced, co-written and directed this fine film.
The story is based on the well known Ecuadorian writer, Juan Valdano’s novel, and focuses on the events in the capital of Quito during the years 1809 and 1810, a crucial period in Ecuador's independence process.
The historical events are presented chronologically from August 10, 1809 to August 2, 1810. Interwoven from the opening scene to the closing are the love story between Judit, her imprisoned husband, the librarian of Quito, and Colonel Arredondo, the Commander of the invading troops sent by the Viceroy in Lima to crush the insurrection.
Director Luzuriaga reinstates the original names of historical characters, gives visible form to his own version of some of the characters created by Juan Valdano, and adds new ones that serve as a flowing nexus to the narrative.
The film visualizes Quito of that era, a small city of 30,000 gentle and religious people, with strict accuracy; takes a demystifying look at historical figures, and delves deeply into the tragic sense of the events of the day.
This film hopefully will demonstrate “to the powers that be” of that country, how important it is to have a well-funded national film industry.

PRESS CLIPS :
“A quirky and gorgeous film hiding behind a sprawling costume drama set in Colonial Quito, directed with loving human detail by Camilo Luzuriaga.”

Miami News Times, Octavio Roca

“It actually looks like a Hollywood production, the difference being that this one has substance and is historically relevant for Ecuadorians and many Latin Americans.”

LFF Chicago, Pepe Vargas

“The impeccable work offers a production of superlative care and realism, with the prodigious Marilú Vaca in the leading role…”

FIC, Mar del Plata, Argentina

“Seeing 1809-1810 AS THE DAY ARRIVES is the chance to discover that there are patriots of film who conserve their own voice and defend their freedom to produce something different from what the world does.”

Magazine Vistazo, Juan E. Pesantez

PRINCIPAL CAST: Marilú Vaca (Judit) - Arístides Vargas (Pedro Matías Ampudia) - Gonzalo Gonzalo (Colonel Arredondo) - Aitor Merino (Loco Manchego) - Víctor Hugo Gallegos (Pintor) – Alfredo Espinosa (Morales) – Santigo Villacís (Barrantes) – Carlos Martínez (Obispo Cuero y Caicedo) – Gerson Guerra (Cura Coloma) – José Alvear (Julián) – Joselino Suntaxi (Martín)

BRODEUSES

FRANCE, 2004
Director: Eléonore Faucher
Drama, 88 minutes

Claire is a high school student working temporarily at a super market in a small French town. When she learns that she’s five months pregnant at the tender age of seventeen, she decides to give birth anonymously. She finds refuge with Madame Melikian, a recently widower who embroiders for a Parisian haute couture designer.
Day by day, stitch by stitch, as Claire’s belly grows rounder, the threads of embroidery create a filial bond between them.
This might sound like a story of a pregnant girl that we have seen before. The difference – and what a big difference it is - is in the artistry of the making of this film and the how of telling the story. Surprisingly this is director’s Eléonore Faucher's first feature film. Awaiting the birth of her own child, she has created something rare in contemporary cinema: an almost silent story, directed with great sensitivity and beauty.

PRINCIPAL CAST: Lola Naymark (Claire), Ariane Ascaride (Madame Melikian), Marie Felix, Thomas Laroppe, Arthur Quehen, Jacky Berroyer.

AWARDS: Critics’ Week Grand Award Cannes Film Festival 2004 – Critics’ Award, French Syndicate of Cinema Critics, 2005 – Three Nominations at the 2005 Cesar Awards (French Academy Awards) for Best Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best First Film.

THE FALL OF FUJIMORI

USA, 2005
Director: Ellen Perry
Feature Documentary, 83 minutes

A brilliant fast moving documentary and a must see for anyone familiar -or unfamiliar- with Latin American -or even contemporary politics.
Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori risked everything to win the war on terrorism. But in stopping the terrorists, he became an international fugitive, wanted for corruption, kidnapping and murder.
This feature documentary is an intimate and troubling look at Alberto Fujimori, the former Peruvian president who now lives in exile in Japan. The film examines the events that defined Fujimori's ten-year presidential reign, including his meteoric rise from being an unknown university professor to the presidency; his relationship with notorious spy chief Vladimiro Montesinos; his "self-coup" ousting Congress and the Judiciary; and the dramatic four-month hostage siege at the Japanese Embassy in Lima.
At the center of Fujimori's presidency was his controversial war on terrorism, including such hard-line tactics as hooded judges, military tribunals, and alleged use of torture and death squads. Within two years, President Fujimori's extreme measures brought success, including the capture of notorious terrorist, Abimael Guzman, founder and mastermind of the blood thirsty Shining Path/Sendero Luminoso”. But Fujimori’s victories came at a crippling cost: democracy, freedom of the press, his presidency, his citizenship, and even his own family. Rocked by growing corruption scandals, Fujimori's decade-long regime came to an abrupt end in 2000, when he fled to Japan, the land of his ancestors, and faxed in his resignation from a Tokyo hotel. In 2003, the international police organization Interpol placed Fujimori on its Most Wanted list for corruption, kidnapping and murder. Undeterred by the indictments against him, Fujimori remains a celebrity in Japan, where he patiently plots his return to Peru and to the Presidency in 2006.