Film of the week: ”Joven y alocada” (Young & Wild) by Marialy Rivas (Making off video)

For this “Film of the Week” section Latin America Film presents  ”Joven y alocada’‘. A chilean film by director Marialy Rivas who after “Cinema under construction” at the last San Sebastian Film Festival has been recently selected for the Sundance Film Festival (World Cinema Dramatic Competition) and the International Film Festival Berlin.
The film tells the story of Daniela, a petite, pretty teenager raised in the bosom of a strict and well-to-do

Film of the week: “Violeta Went to Heaven” (Violeta se fue a los cielos) by Andres Wood (Trailer)

A BF release (in Chile) of a Minera Escondida presentation of a Wood Producciones, Maiz Producciones, Bossa Nova Films production in association with BG TV. (International sales: Wood Producciones, Santiago.)
Executive producers, Patricio Pereira , Pablo Rovito, Fernando Sokolowicz, Denise Gomes, Paula Cosenza, Billy Garlick.
Directed by Andres Wood.
Screenplay, Eliseo Altunaga, Rodrigo Bazaes, Guillermo Calderon, Wood, based on the book by Angel Parra.

Film of the week: “Pescador” by Sebastian Cordero

Take one South American drug heist, mix with a clownish fisherman convinced he’s of elevated birth, and shake with a pretty girl out for the money. This is Pescador, an enjoyable genre-bender that takes award-winning Equador filmmaker Sebastian Cordero somewhat alarmingly far from his roots: the exposé of an unscrupulous TV reporter Chronicles and the claustrophobic romantic thriller Rage. Unexpected but artful enough, this homey variation on the gangster/road movie, gently retouched with humor, should make inways into Latin American markets after its festival run.
Paunchy Blanquito (“Whitey”) is the film’s whole banana and is a taste that grows on you,

Film of the week: Porfirio by Alejandro Landes (Selected at the Toronto Film Festival)

Porfirio is confined to a wheelchair after the police shot him in the back, but show little willingness to compensate him for the ruins that remain from his former life.
Programmer’s Note
Welcome to the true story of the Air Pirate, told from the perspective of the man himself. Porfirio

Film of the week: “Adios Mundo Cruel” (Goodbye, Cruel World) – Trailer -

Sometimes going into a movie not knowing what to expect can be the best way to do it. Even going in with a basic idea of the plot but no clue as to what the film will be like tonally can intensify your overall opinion about the film. That was certainly the case for the Mexican film GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD, a film about a man whose terrible outcomes turn into our comedic pleasures.
Angel (Carlos Alberto Orozco) can’t catch a break. It all starts when he loses his job, in this economic

Film of the week: “The Year Of The Tiger” by Sebastian Lelio (Trailer)

An existential metaphor whose philosophical implications may reach way beyond the realm or the capacity of cinema to deal with, this is yet another grim and forbidding look at human condition, Latin-American style.
The film screened in competition at Locarno.
This is first and foremost an allegory, not to be taken literally but inviting the viewer to seek the messages

Film Review Of Zoe Saldana’s “Colombiana”

Olivier Megaton directs the latest bullets and bras thriller from the Luc Besson film factory.
Jean-Luc Godard’s famous remark that all you need to make a movie is “a girl and a gun” doesn’t quite hold water for Luc Besson. In his world, you need one girl wearing as little as possible, and at least fifty guns, preferably firing at the same time. Such is the formula applied to Colombiana, the latest EuropaCorp effort produced and co-scripted by Besson, and directed by in-house auteur Olivier Megaton, whose mise-en-scène is often as subtle as his last name sounds. Still, there are guilty pleasures to be had in this frenzied B starring Zoe Saldana (Avatar, Star Trek), who gives an acrobatic performance that makes the overcooked material watchable, if not entirely enjoyable.

Film of the week: “Blacktino” by Aaron Burns (Trailer)

Blacktino is a quirky dark comedy about a half black and latino theater geek named Stefan Daily and is the directorial debut of Austin filmmaker Aaron Burns.

THE SET-UP
Stefan Daily is raised by his grandmother since being abandoned by his movie producer father and drug addicted mother. Uncomfortable and unsure of himself his only refuge is in the theater department of his high school and his best friend Laura (Devyn Ray). As he deals with trying to be accepted by the other students and the trials of his family life he finds hope in his passion for theatre.

Film of the week: “Summer of Goliath” (Review)

Veering from cinéma-vérité to domestic melodrama to absurdist comedy, Summer of Goliath ostensibly depicts a few days in the lives of the citizens of Huilotepec, Mexico, but by the end of the portrait, we’re not really sure what to make of Nicolas Pereda’s new film. A cult following might result if folks catch onto the film’s sheer odd quality.
Mexican-born Pereda, who at 29 is enjoying a career retrospective this July at New York’s Anthology Film Archives, merits attention as an up-and-coming filmmaker. Even with Summer of Goliath, which doesn’t always work, he shows promise as a multi-hyphenate director-writer-producer-editor.

Film of the week: Chico & Rita

Sexy, sunny and sweet-natured, this lovely animation by film-maker Fernando Trueba and artist and designer Javier Mariscal is a 1940s love story with all the brassy passion of a Barry Manilow number, set in the nightclubs of Havana and New York. Rita, voiced by Limara Meneses, is a beautiful Cuban singer who has to scrape a living; Chico (Eman Xor Oña) is a talented, underemployed pianist thunderstruck with love for Rita when she meanders on stage for a solo. Their passionate affair and professional