The Mexican film festival that’s building bridges… | Little White Lies

Festivals

The Mex­i­can film fes­ti­val that’s build­ing bridges with North America

11 Oct 2016

Words by Adam Woodward

Pedestrian walkway with wire mesh overhead, person running along the path past graffiti on the ground.
Pedestrian walkway with wire mesh overhead, person running along the path past graffiti on the ground.
The direc­tor of the Los Cabos Inter­na­tion­al Film Fes­ti­val dis­cuss­es the impor­tance of sup­port­ing film­mak­ers across the border.

Ear­li­er this year we pro­filed the young female direc­tors who are lead­ing Mexico’s cin­e­ma rev­o­lu­tion, and now oth­ers like them will be show­cas­ing their work at an inter­na­tion­al­ly focused film fes­ti­val described as ​“the Cannes of Latin Amer­i­ca.” The Baja town of Los Cabos is home to the Los Cabos Film Fes­ti­val, which cel­e­brates its fifth edi­tion Novem­ber 9 – 13.

We’ll be head­ing out to sam­ple the festival’s eclec­tic pro­gramme, which includes region­al pre­mieres of Pablo Larraín’s Jack­ie, Raf­fi Pitts’ Soy Nero, Garth Davis’ Lion, Anto­nio Cam­pos’ Chris­tine and Babak Anvari’s Under the Shad­ow. In the mean­time, we caught up with fes­ti­val direc­tor Alon­so Aguilar to get his thoughts on how this year’s pro­gramme is shap­ing up as well as the festival’s over­ar­ch­ing goals. ​“I believe this is a very human indus­try and we try to short­en the dis­tances between peo­ple. Since the begin­ning the fes­ti­val has been about build­ing roads between Mex­i­co and North Amer­i­ca. Although the pro­gramme feels very North Amer­i­can, you can see that through co-pro­duc­tion we have rep­re­sen­ta­tion from Iran, Spain and Colombia.”

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It’s encour­ag­ing to hear about the festival’s ambi­tion to strength­en cul­tur­al ties with its neigh­bour across the bor­der, espe­cial­ly when one of the can­di­dates for the US Pres­i­den­cy has expressed his desire to do the exact oppo­site. Of course, Los Cabos is also hot on cham­pi­oning home­grown tal­ent, and this year will present new works from Lucía Car­reras, María José Cuevas and Amat Escalante whose The Untamed recent­ly won the Sil­ver Lion prize at the Venice Film Festival.

But Aguilar is par­tic­u­lar­ly keen to empha­sise the huge effort Los Cabos makes each year in sup­port­ing North Amer­i­can film­mak­ers: ​“We just announced the 26 select­ed projects for our Gabriel Figueroa Film Fund, the largest num­ber we’ve ever pro­grammed. The fund pro­vides a vital boost for films and TV projects in devel­op­ment, not just from Mex­i­co but from the US and Cana­da. We hope to keep get­ting stronger so that we are able to pro­mote our own region while attract­ing an inter­na­tion­al film market.”

For more info on this year’s fes­ti­val vis­it cabosfilm​fes​ti​val​.com

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