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“The dead man doesn’t help” – 7 Reasons To Run Away (2019) at the Raindance Film Festival Dir: Esteve Soler, Gerardo Quinto & David Torras
Brutal, hilarious, black humour at its best, the film ‘7 Reasons to Run away’ (2019) is made up from a group of independent stories listed under respectable, socially conscious titles: Solidarity, Order, Property, Work,…
Caballerango (Dir Juan Pablo González)
‘CABALLERANGO’, by Mexican film maker Juan Pablo González, is a feature-length documentary examining the effects of a suicide on a family and the people of a village afflicted by more than one such death, some by consuming…
Djon África ( 2018) Directed by Filipa Reis and João Miller Guerra
Terratreme Films is a production company based in Lisbon, Portugal. Their aim acknowledges that only the direct intervention of the directors in the concept, pre-production and budget can lead to a successful outcome that…
Pain & Glory Dir. Pedro Almodóvar
Along with Law of Desire and Bad Education, Pain and Glory represents the third and final instalment of an unplanned trilogy which has taken thirty-two years to complete. The three films all focus on male film directors as…
ROJO (2018) Dir Benjamin Naishtat
“Sometime people participate by taking action but sometimes they act through omission.” Set in Argentina during the 1970s and early 1980s, this psychological thriller questions another dark side of the period of military…
THE CHAMBERMAID Dir. Lila Avilés
Filmed in an astonishing 17 days, the multi- award-winning film, THE CHAMBERMAID, follows the daily routine of a 20-something chambermaid who is responsible for the 21st floor of a 5-star luxury hotel. Endless corridors…
Batida Lisboa (Dir. Rita Maia, Vasco Viana)
Rita Maia and Vasco Viana’s charming musical documentary takes us on a journey around the tough Lisbon ghettos and suburbs where we experience the lives of a number of Portuguese-speaking African musicians who are searching to…
ORDINARY TIME (Tempo Común) Dir. Susana Nobre
A contemplative and minimalist film that reveals a moving life cycle as it delves into the lives of a young couple and their daughter during her first year of life. A quiet study of parenthood with a gentle intimacy and subtle…
OUR TIME (Dir. Carlos Reygadas)
‘Our Time’ (Nuestro Tiempo) 2018 challenges our ideas of man’s condition in life. Juan Díaz and his beautiful wife Esther run a ranch in Mexico rearing fighting bulls. They have a perfect relationship in an open marriage, or so…
Top 10 Summer Latin Films
Latin Cinema is in full bloom. Here’s a glimpse at the Latin and Spanish films coming up this summer to whisk you away from the heat.
Spirits, Birds, Omens, Dreams and Death.
Ciro Guerra & Cristina Gallego talk about their film ‘Birds Of Passage’, which relates the extraordinary narrative of how the incipient and often casual trade of Marijuana lead to the notorious drug’s trade in Colombia and…
Birds of Passage (Dir. Cristina Gallego and Ciro Guerra)
Through a series of five ‘songs’ or ‘cantos’, ‘Birds of Passage’ tells the painful story of how the drugs trade began in Colombia in the 1960s. From modest beginning, the Wayuu tribe found themselves involved as it began. The…
A Boy Called Sailboat (Dir. Cameron Nugent)
Once upon a time, a sick grandmother asked her grandson to write her a song on his little guitar. When he did, his song set a series of transformations in motion in this heart-warming fable.
Division Ave (2019)
This aptly named short film, ‘Division Ave’, illustrates the divide between immigrant workers and locals, and the struggle that these workers face, usually without work visas, to try to provide for their loved ones back home.
Messenger on a White horse (2019) El Mensajero
‘Messenger on a White Horse’ is a moving documentary that portrays the courage of Robert (Bob) Cox, Editor in Chief of THE BUENOS AIRES HERALD who dared to publish information exposing the human rights abuses carried out by the…
Breaking the Mould in Paraguay
Marcelo Martinessi’s fascinating study of a lesbian couple affected by social mores in Paraguayan society is submitted to the 91st Academy Awards.
YULI (2018) – Born to Dance
YULI is a skilful adaptation by Paul Laverty (I, Daniel Blake) of the dancer Carlos Acosta’s life story as revealed in his autobiography 'No Way Home' Directed by Icíar Bollaín, the film conveys a sensitive intimacy…
EVERYBODY KNOWS - When a Secret is not a Secret
When a young teenager is kidnapped at a family wedding in a small Spanish town, layer-by-layer, dark secrets, unsatisfied revenge and rivalries are revealed. Unable to contact the police, the whole family is trapped in a fraught…
Adolescence and Obsession in ‘A Trip to the Moon’
The Argentine director Joaquín Cambre talks to Latino Life about his own life and his award-winning opèra prima, A TRIP TO THE MOON, about an adolescent who, feeling out of sync with his family and his world, focuses his…
Gledys Ibarra: I am testimony that 'una negra del barrio' with a mission can succeed
Gledys Ibarra broke the mould back in Venuezuela as one of the country's first black telenovela stars, having starred in a string of popular Venezuelan telenovelas that have been translated into many languages and shown all…
Two New Brazilian films revel in gore
Aficionados of fantasy and horror had a few treats in the 2018 London Film Festival, notably emerging from Brazil, The Cannibal Club 2018 (Guto Parente) and Morto não Fala (The Nightshifter 2018): one a minimalistic horror film (…
Chile's Artistic Renaissance Questions the Past
From decades of silence and a few lone voices such as documentary-maker Patricio Guzman, has come a flourishing arts industry in Chile, with film studios like Fabula, Oscar-winning directors like Sebastian Lelio, and artists like…
Elliot Grove: The beating heart of RAINDANCE
London is a creative hub, and the number of film festivals over the year are truly astonishing. They represent a myriad of countries from China, Latin America, Brazil, India and Africa to local British productions. The Raindance…
TIDES (2017) Unwinding down winding canals
Shot in mesmerizing Black & White against a backdrop of Surrey’s serene canals, a group of forty something friends who have not seen each other for a while, decide to spend a weekend on a narrow boat to rekindle their…
DISOBEDIENCE (2018) Forbidden love is never easy, let alone in a closed religious community.
When photographer Ronit Krushka returns from New York to London after many years, for her father’s funeral, a forbidden love that had been the cause of her departure is re-ignited with powerful consequences.
DEAR CHICKENS: A moving short Film takes aim for the Oscars.
DEAR CHICKENS (2018) is a powerful short film that premiered at the LA International Short Film Festival in July 2018. Directed by Swiss/Mexican Mauro Mueller it is now officially eligible to compete for Best Live Action Short…
'ROMA' by Alfonso Cuarón sweeps the boards at the BAFTAs.
ROMA (2018) by Alfonso Cuarón, a masterpiece of cinema, has been crowned the outstanding film of 2018 at the BAFTAs. Semi-autobiographical, it was created with deep affection in homage to a person who was and remains of huge…
Surviving Venezuela
‘Surviving Venezuela: Smuggling Dreams’, directed by Anglo-Peruvian Alexander ‘Lali’ Houghton is a TV documentary filmed in 2017 for ‘Witness’, Al Jazeera. It was short listed for a Rory Peck Award (2018), as well for the Foreign…
Carmen & Lola (2018) A forbidden Gypsy Love
Spanish director Arantxa Echevarría disturbs the status quo with her opera prima about love between two teenage girls from a close-knit Roma Community in the Vallecas suburb of Madrid. Corina J Poore catches up with the exuberant…
Nae Pasaran(2018) Scottish Solidarity to Powerful Effect from Afar.
NAE PASARAN (2018) is a stunning documentary written, directed and produced by Felipe Bustos Sierra. It is the moving true story of how a group of engineers working in a Scottish factory did their bit to help prevent more…
Bridge or Barrier? 10.000km (2014) New Release
Can a modern relationship survive long distance? Facebook, Skype and social media are designed to bring people closer, are they not? The award-winning opera prima ‘10.000 km (2014)’ of Carlos Marques-Marcet is finally available…
Myth or Reality, and Does it Matter?
Supposedly based on a true story about Basque farm lad, who started to grow uncontrollably to became Europe’s tallest man, reaching a height of 2,42m, Handia swept the boards at the 2018 Goya Awards, winning 10 out of their 13…
A Big Budget for a Big Man
HANDIA (Giant) swept the boards at the 2018 GOYA AWARDS, with 13 nominations, and carrying away 10 awards. In particular it won Best original Script, Best New Actor, as well as awards for Cinematography, Editing, Special Effects…
Three Short Films: Madre, Piggy and Fifteen
Corina J Poore reviews three Latino offerings from the 'Shorts' programme at this year's The BFI London Film Festival: ‘MADRE (2017)’ by Spanish writer/director Rodrigo Sorogoyen, ‘PIGGY (Cerdita) 2018’, (14 min…
Truth or Illusion?
The unusual tale of a commune in the south of Chile takes us on an unexpected journey.It is based on a true story that immediately suggests that upsetting developments may take place, as indeed they do. Produced by the creative…
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