Intrades.org
FEATURE: Nonfiction is heart of the story in Mexico:Posted By: Jim Thatcher By John Hecht MEXICO CITY (Hollywood Reporter) - When 23-year-old Tin Dirdamal decided to make his first documentary, he had no film experience to speak of, yet he was itching to tell a story about the hardships of Central American immigrants. So he grabbed a camcorder, rounded up about $7,000 and started shooting. This year, his picture "No One" won the World Cinema Audience Award at Sundance for best documentary.Much like many new Mexican directors, Dirdamal felt he had an important story to tell. All too often, he says, the most compelling stories about real people go untold in Mexican cinema. That appears to be changing. After years of all but ignoring the nonfiction genre, the film industry here is showing growing interest in supporting these projects. Film critic Octavio Maya believes Mexico is experiencing a boom in documentary filmmaking for two simple reasons. "First, you don't need a lot of money to make a documentary," Maya notes. "Second, the nonfiction films here are reaching out to audiences more than the fiction films, so I believe there's a growing appetite, not just in Mexico, but also in the U.S., to see movies that deal with issues that people can relate to." Dirdamal's "No One," a story about the difficulties Central American immigrants endure when passing through Mexico to the U.S., does just that and it proves that big things often come in small packages. "I think there's this idea that in order for a film to be good, it has to be huge," Dirdamal says. "But if you look at a lot of the fiction films being made, which have much larger budgets, the stories just aren't that interesting." With the cash prizes that Dirdamal has received for "No One," he is shooting a new documentary about the water wars in Bolivia. Another Mexican documentary that came up big at Sundance was Juan Carlos Rulfo's "In the Pit," which won the World Cinema Jury Prize for best documentary. The film looks at the difficult lives of a group of construction workers who helped build a monumental freeway deck in Mexico City. It also nabbed the Knight Grand Jury Prize at the Miami International Film Festival. "In the Pit" received funding from the Sundance Institute Documentary Fund and Mexico's state-run film institute Imcine. Important industry figures also are throwing their support behind nonfiction cinema. Canana Films, a production company run by actors Gael Garcia Bernal, Diego Luna and producer Pablo Cruz, launched a 15-city documentary tour earlier this year in association with Mexico's top movie theater chain, Cinepolis. "We are doing this as an experiment to see how distribution can be modified in Mexico, and so far it is working very well," Cruz says. Film critic Maya points out that it is becoming a much more common practice for documentary filmmakers to approach movie theaters directly, allowing them to eliminate the need for a distributor. Cinepolis also hosts the annual Morelia International Film Festival, the nation's most important platform for documentary films. Last year's winner, "Black Bull," also secured the Horizons Award at the San Sebastian Film Festival in Spain. "Black Bull" tells the story of a self-destructive amateur bullfighter who is often too drunk to defend himself. Mexican director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu executive-produced the movie. He liked the film so much that he invited co-directors Pedro Gonzalez-Rubio and Carlos Armella to document the making of "Babel," his latest picture, starringBrad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. Despite the success of these and other Mexican documentaries on the festival circuit, it remains to be seen if this new wave of filmmaking can deliver box office results. Yet considering that a typical local fiction feature costs about $2 million, and very few producers are recouping their investments, nonfiction projects are looking much more attractive. "We are seeing a new trend in Mexican filmmaking," Maya says. "And it is starting to work outside of the film festival circuit." Reuters/Hollywood Reporter Courtesy Of: Yahoo! News The information reported above is property of Yahoo! inc. and reprinted or modified with legitimate permission. We thank Yahoo! inc. for the kind cooperation with us and other shareholders. |
|
Bookmark | Contact Us | Search
Copyright ©2005-2010 MAS Network