THE HOLA MEXICO FILM FESTIVAL USA ’09 ARRIVES IN LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA; FEATURING THE BEST OF RECENT MEXICAN CINEMA
Hollywood and International celebrities will attend the opening night red carpet and film screening of ARRANCAME LA VIDA (TEAR THIS HEART OUT) at the Arclight Cinemas on June 9, 2009
Los Angeles, California (June 8, 2009) – The Hola Mexico Film Festival USA ’09, which in only two editions has become the largest Mexican film festival abroad, makes its first stop in Los Angeles California, bringing a taste of the exciting and revamped Mexican film production of recent years. The Hola Mexico Film Festival features a carefully selected program showcasing the rich diversity of current Mexican cinema, offering a wide selection for different cinematic tastes. The program showcases 13 feature films, including 8 LA premieres, and includes works by celebrated up-and-coming young directors such as Andrea Martínez (Insignificant Things, produced by Academy Award-nominated Mexican director Guillermo del Toro) and Gerardo Naranjo (I’m Gonna Explode, Official Selection New York Film Festival 2008).
The program also features Mexican blockbusters Arrancame la vida (Tear this Heart Out) by Roberto Sneider (Mexico’s official selection to the Academy Awards) and the animated film Another Egg Movie and a Chicken by Rodolpho and Gabriel Rivas Palacio, both films topped the box office last year in Mexico. All of the films will be competing for the CineLatino Audience Award. The festival will also have directors and actors as special guests who will present their films and offer Q&A sessions after the screenings.
Hola Mexico Film Festival starts on Tuesday, June 9rd with a red carpet, film screening of Arrancame la vida (Tear this Heart Out). Directed by Roberto Sneider. The film is based on the novel by Angeles Mastretta, and set in the backdrop of Mexico’s post-revolutionary period of the ’30s and ’40s. The story begins with the beautiful Catalina Guzmán (Ana Claudia Talancón) who at an early age marries an older, charismatic and cunning General, Andrés Ascencio (Daniel Giménez Cacho). Intrigued by his world, Catalina accompanies Andrés on his political campaigns, closely observing the intricacies of the political system in hopes of achieving justice for the oppressed. She soon discovers that by dedicating her life to the General she might not attain her own freedom. Tear This Heart Out was Mexico’s official entry for the Academy Awards® and one of the most expensive and successful films in Mexican cinema history. The opening night party will feature the music of I.M.S, one of the most groundbreaking bands to come out of Mexico in recent years. Their music combines Mexicans classic rhythms and melodies such as cumbia with electronic beats. Also performing is Pistolera, who is known for its melodic and danceable songs performed in Spanish. The strong political content of their lyrics often discuss border issues, the plight of immigrants and female strength. Pistolera has climbed the charts and have been featured in various publications, including in Rolling Stone Mexico, Billboard and The New Yorker.
Hola Mexico Film Festival 09 runs from June 9 to 13, 2009. All screenings will take place at the Arclight Cinemas in Hollywood. (6360 W Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA) See www.arclightcinemas.com for more information. Advance ticket purchase available at www.holamexicoff.com and www.arclightcinemas.com. Media accreditations requests can only be submitted online at http://tapizmedia.com/?page_id=45. Due to space limitations for the opening night red carpet, we encourage you to submit promptly your accreditation request.
Hola Mexico Film Festival USA ’09 is sponsored by American Airlines, the Mexican Tourism Board, the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York, Dish Latino, Chipotle, Cinelatino, Pomada de la Campana, Vanart. Additional support provided by Jarritos, Spenglish, La Esquina, Tapiz Media Group and Dos Equis. Cultural Partners: Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Consulates General of Mexico in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York, Mexican Film Institute (IMCINE), Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes and the New York City Latin Media & Entertainment Commission. Media Sponsors: Telemundo 47, ICN 15, Hoy, Vanidades, Hispanic Magazine, LA Weekly, Diario de México, indieWIRE, Filmmaker Magazine and Remezcla.
PROGRAM
Tuesday, June 9 7:30pm. ARRANCAME LA VIDA / TEAR THIS HEART OUT
(Roberto Sneider, Mexico, 2008, 110min. In Spanish with English subtitles. New York Premiere)
Cast: Ana Claudia Talancon, Daniel Giménez Cacho, José María de Tavira.
Based on the novel by Angeles Mastretta, and set in the backdrop of Mexico’s post-revolutionary period of the ’30s and ’40s, the film evokes the politics and passion of the time. The story begins with the beautiful Catalina Guzmán (Ana Claudia Talancón) who at an early age marries an older, charismatic and cunning General, Andrés Ascencio (Daniel Giménez Cacho). Intrigued by his world, Catalina accompanies Andrés on his political campaigns, closely observing the intricacies of the political system in hopes of achieving justice for the oppressed. She soon discovers that by dedicating her life to the General she might not attain her own freedom. Tear This Heart Out was Mexico’s official entry for the Academy Awards® and one of the most expensive and successful films in Mexican cinema history.
9:00pm. Opening Night Fiesta Wednesday, June 10
1:00pm. DESIERTO ADENTRO / THE DESERT WITHIN
(Rodrigo Plá, Mexico, 2008, 112 min. In Spanish with English Subtitles)
Cast: Diego Cataño, Guillermo Dorantes, Katia Xanat Espino.
Elías has committed a sin against God and fears he will be punished, convinced that God’s wrath will manifest itself in the premature death of his eight children. In order to change his family’s destiny and earn God’s forgiveness, he chooses to live in seclusion and dedicates his life to the construction of a church. The director was initially prompted to make the film after discovering the diaries of the philosopher Sören Kierkegaard, who describes his fear of being condemned to a premature death by his father. Events unfolding during the 20th century allowed the filmmaker to transfer the story from a Protestant environment to a Catholic and Mexican setting, and to capture an image of irrational religiosity within a specific historical context. The film closed International Critics’ Week at Cannes last year.
Awards: Winner Guadalajara Film Festival – Best Film, Audience Award and Mezcal Award; Winner Best Cinematography Havana Film Festival.
3:30pm. LOS LADRONES VIEJOS. LAS LEYENDAS DEL ARTEGIO / THE OLD THIEVES
(Everardo Gonzalez, Mexico, 2007, 97 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
“Probably the most audacious heist movie you’ll ever see—and all the more remarkable for being a true story.”—Trondheim (Norway) International Film Festival. The Old Thieves examines a generation of real-life thieves who were famous in 1960s Mexico for their exploits and the wild success they enjoyed in the process. While telling the story of the legendary El Carrizos and other famous outlaws of the time, director Everardo González paints a chilling yet humorous portrait of the Mexican criminal underworld: the delinquents who thrived in the city and, more alarming, their close connections to the authorities who allowed them to continue their business. The thieves recount their story from prison, recalling both the glorified era in which they were virtually unstoppable and the price they eventually had to pay. Nominated for two Ariels, Mexico’s national awards, for best picture and director.
Awards: Winner in Biarritz, Havana, Guadalajara and many more.
5:40pm. TE ACUERDAS DE LAKE TAHOE? / LAKE TAHOE
(Fernando Eimbcke (Mexico 2008, 81min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Teenage Juan crashes his family’s car into a telegraph pole on the outskirts of town, and then scours the streets searching for someone to help him fix it. His quest will bring him to Don Heber, an old paranoid mechanic whose only companion is Sica, his almost human boxer dog; to Lucía, a young mother who is convinced that her real place in life is as a lead singer in a punk band, and to “The One who Knows”, a teenage mechanic obsessed with martial arts and Kung Fu philosophy. The absurd and bewildering worlds of these characters drag Juan into a one day journey in which he will come to accept what he was escaping from in the first place–an event both as natural and inexplicable as a loved one’s death.
Awards: Winner – Alfred Bauer Prize and FIPRESCI Award – Berlin Int’l FF, Best Film – Ariel Awards 2009, Best Director Guadalajara FF
7:30pm. OTRA PELICULA DE HUEVOS Y UN POLLO / ANOTHER EGG MOVIE AND A CHICKEN
(Rodolpho y Gabriel Rivas Palacio, Mexico, 2009, 90 min. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
Follow Toto, Willy and Bibi into their new adventure full of old and new friends alike! Toto, now a chicken, tries to live as such, but when an egg witch from the desert needs a chicken’s heart to cast a spell, he sends out his vulture, ostrich and scorpion egg cohorts to kidnap Toto. Willy and Bibi set out across the dangerous desert to rescue their chicken friend and find themselves swept up in wild adventures, meeting an old hawk egg and ground roe along the way. This film is full of double entendres in Spanish making this a cartoon for big kids. ¡Qué huevos!
9:45pm. AURORA BOREAL
(Sergio Tovar Velarde, Mexico, 2008, 78 min, In Spanish With English subtitles.)
Cast: Jose Luis Martinez, Renatto Bartilotti
A truly remarkable cinematic achievement! Mexico, 1994. Mariano, a tormented fourteen year old boy has decided to commit suicide, leaving behind his testimony: a videotape explaining his rationale for taking his life, his increasing distance from his family and his pervasive feelings of guilt. The result of his recording is a nostalgic and touching portrait of a young man’s particular vision of the world. Filmed in a subjective style, the spectator is taken on a journey trough the eyes of Mariano. www.auroraboreal.com.mx
Thursday, June 11
1:00pm. TODO INCLUIDO / ALL INCLUSIVE
(Rodrigo Ortúzar, Mexico/Chile, 2008, 95 min. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
Cast: Martha Higareda, Ana Serradilla, Jesus Ochoa, Jaime Camil, Maya Zapata.
Showcasing a brilliant cast, this may be the feel good film of the festival! All Inclusive tells the story of a Mexican family that is built up and torn down again during a five-day vacation at a resort on the Mayan Riviera. When an unexpected hurricane forces the family into close quarters, they can no longer escape their familial dysfunction and must begin to truly understand one another for the first time.
3:30pm. VOY A EXPLOTAR / I’M GONNA EXPLODE
(Gerardo Naranjo, Mexico, 2008, 103 min. In Spanish With English subtitles)
Cast: Juan Pablo de Santiago, Maria Deschamps, Daniel Giménez Cacho.
Voy a Explotar narrates the romantic escapades of Roman and Maru, two troubled teenagers who initiate an impossible rebellion against the adult world. Tortured by violent fantasies, and craving the attention of his father, Roman attempts suicide several times. His life is changed when he meets Maru, a solitary girl who is sexually harassed by her relentless ex-boyfriend. Roman and Maru are united in rebellion against all, and decide to disappear to a place where no one will find them; the roof of Roman’s house. Their new life together pushes them to discover their sexuality and an intense intimacy. Realizing they will soon be discovered and separated, the young pair looks to expand the limits of their recently formed paradise and departs for the real world, where the wounds are true and the actions have consequences.
Official Selection: New York Film Festival 2008; Toronto Film Festival 2008; Venice Film Festival 2008.
6:00pm. EL VIAJE DE TEO / TEO’S JOURNEY
(Walter Doehner, Mexico, 2008, 92 min. In Spanish with English Subtitles.)
Cast: Damián Alcázar, Erick Cañete, Joaquín Cosío.
A touching and inspiring story! Teo, a 9 year-old boy, travels toward an uncertain destiny as he illegally crosses the Mexican-American border with his estranged father, who appears unannounced one day in the boys home. Helped along by a negligent pollero, father and son are attacked and robbed one night, forcing Teo to flee into the desert. Upon stopping his frenetic sprint, Teo realizes that he is by himself and abandoned in the night. Chuy, a 12 year old pollero, meets Teo and helps him to the border, where Teo is forced to wait at the check point in Nogales for his father’s certain deportation. Day after day he witnesses the failed attempts of men and women who are sent back to México as he develops a deep friendship with his new companion.
7:30pm. LAKE TAHOE (repeat screening, see Wednesday, June 10 schedule)
9:45pm. IL MIGLIORI SENTIMENTI / THE BEST OF FEELINGS
(Marcos Villasenor, Mexico/Italy, 2009, 82 min. In Italian with English subtitles.)
Cast: Majlinda Agaj, Vanda Cantele, Francesca Corigliano.
Sixteen years ago, Vincenzo Romano left his wife, Francesca, and his two daughters, Bianca and Alessia, without saying a word. Today, the three women are at home, holding a closed-casket, private funeral for the man Francesca says is Vincenzo. The unusual ceremony, interspersed with vignettes from their lives, reveals the utter lack of communication between the three protagonists and their radically opposed natures. When the funeral is suddenly interrupted by the unexpected sound of the doorbell, they find a man claiming to be Vincenzo, back for good and sorry for everything. The film—going back and forward in time over the course of the year leading up to the fateful funeral day—is told three times from the perspective of each of the three women, united and divided at the same time by the man that abandoned them sixteen years earlier. A dark take on the nature of human beings and their relationships, Il Migliori Sentimenti exists in a universe where nothing is quite what it originally seemed.
Friday, June 12
1:00pm. AURORA BOREAL (repeat screening, see Wednesday, June 10 schedule)
3:00pm. IL MIGLIORI SENTIMENTI / THE BEST OF FEELINGS
(Juan Carlos Martinez, Mexico, 2008, 101 min. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
Cast: Luisa Saenz, Andres Almeida, Hector Arredondo.
We all pass through an age in which reality seems a dream, yet for those who are alert, a time of awakening must eventually come. This is a film about awakenings, but it is also a simple story about a complex relationship. With an impressive cinematography and music score by Ian Brown, 40 Days dramatizes the journey of three Mexicans through the United States of America, showing how the trip affects each individual in different ways as they travel an American landscape by turns beautiful and profoundly sad, so different and yet so similar to our own.
7:30pm. CONOZCA LA CABEZA DE JUAN PEREZ / MEET THE HEAD OF JUAN PEREZ
(Emilio Portes, Mexico 2008, 87min, 35mm. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
Cast: Silverio Palacios, Dolores Heredia, Isela Vega.
One of the funniest comedies to come out of Mexico in recent years, Conozca la Cabeza de Juan Pérez tells the story of a not-so-typical Mexican circus, where The Magician, Juan Perez, decides to bring glory back to the dying circus by stealing a 16th century guillotine for a final act, but he doesn’t know that it also carries a deadly curse.
Awards: Mayahuel Awards for Best Actress, Dolores Heredia and Best First Film – Guadalajara Film Festival.
9:30pm. AMOR, DOLOR Y VICEVERSA / LOVE, PAIN AND VICEVERSA
(Alfonso Pineda-Ulloa, Mexico, 2008, 86 min. In Spanish with English subtitles)
Cast: Barbara Mori, Irene Azuela
This hypnotic sexual thriller, one of a new genre of commercially savvy Mexican productions, takes the audience on a dark journey through a psychological hall of mirrors. Upscale architect Chelo (Mori) has never met a flesh-and-blood man who could measure up to the dream lover she rendezvous with in vivid detail every night. Determined to bring him into the waking world, she devises the bizarre scheme of roughing herself up and claiming she has been raped in order to set the police on the trail of the man who visits her in her dreams.
Saturday, June 13
12:00pm. OTRA PELICULA DE HUEVOS Y UN POLLO / ANOTHER EGG MOVIE AND A CHICKEN (repeat screening, see Wednesday, June 10 schedule)
2:30pm. ARRANCAME LA VIDA / TEAR THIS HEART OUT
7:30pm. EL VIAJE DE TEO / TEO’S JOURNEY (repeat screening, see Thursday, June 11 schedule)
9:30pm. VOY A EXPLOTAR / I’M GONNA EXPLODE (repeat screening, see Thursday, June 11 schedule)
Sunday, June 14
12:00pm. LOS LADRONES VIEJOS. LAS LEYENDAS DEL ARTEGIO / THE OLD THIEVES (repeat screening, see Wednesday, June 10 schedule)
2:00pm. CONOZCA LA CABEZA DE JUAN PEREZ / MEET THE HEAD OF JUAN PEREZ (repeat screening, see Friday, June 12 schedule)
4:00pm. AMOR, DOLOR Y VICEVERSA / LOVE, PAIN AND VICEVERSA (repeat screening, see Friday, June 12 schedule)
6:00pm. COSAS INSIGNIFICANTES / INSIGNIFICANT THINGS
(Andrea Martinez, Mexico/Spain, 2008, 98 min. In Spanish with English subtitles.)
Cast: Barbara Mori
Produced by mastermind Guillermo Del Toro, Insignificant Things tells the story of Esmeralda, a teenager with an unusual obsession: she collects objects lost, forgotten or discarded by people she doesn’t know and keeps them in a box beneath her bed. This is the tale of three objects in the box and the people behind them, all in some way incapable of relating to the person they love most. It is also a tale of the box itself and how Esmeralda learns to open it, to feel and to treasure the most valuable thing of all: human relationships.
8:00pm. TODO INCLUIDO / ALL INCLUSIVE (repeat screening, see Thursday, June 11 schedule)
For more information and tickets visit www.holamexicoff.com
