QCinema International Film Festival offers a hybrid presentation of its lineup of films this year in response to the quarantine restrictions brought about by the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. There will be limited invitational screenings of three films in an open air venue at the Gazebo Royale, Visayas Ave. Quezon City. The rest of the 16 other films will be shown online via Upstream and GMovies platform.
The first two films I chose to watch are from Latin America with things in common. They are films written and directed by female filmmakers on their feature film debuts. Both tackling the story of a mother who embarked on a search of their missing child. They have been acclaimed in multiple international film festivals this year.
Director: Fernanda Valadez
Writers: Fernanda Valadez and Astrid Rondero
Magdalena (Mercedes Hernandez) was a middle-aged woman from the central city of Guanajuato who decided to go search for her son Jesus (Juan Jesus Varela) when she learned that the dead body of Rigo, her son's best friend and companion on their attempt to enter the US illegally, was found buried in a shallow grave along the way. Her ordeal began at the terminal of the bus her son rode, and her search brought her to the remote town of Ocampo, where she met a young man just deported from the US, Miguel (David Illescas).
At first this felt like a cut and dry procedural about Mexicans who went missing while illegally crossing the US border. However, by the second half of the film, it turned out to be something else altogether, as lawless bandits who terrorized remote towns came into the picture. The shocking climax came like a gut punch from out of the blue. The denouement was sad, heartbreaking and even carried an unexpected twist. That final image of a devilish figure slowly emerging from the flames was absolutely mesmerizing. 9/10
Director: Melina León
Writers: Melina León and Michael J. White
Georgina (Pamela Mendoza) was a 20 year-old indigenous peasant woman from a coastal town, who was in her 9th month of pregnancy. She heard a radio advertisement from a clinic in Lima that provided free services for mothers giving birth so she sought it out. However, after her daughter was delivered, Georgina was hustled out of the clinic and she never saw her child at all. Later, the whole clinic seemed to have totally closed up. Ignored by the police, Georgina desperately sought the assistance of journalist Pedro Campos (Tommy Paraga).
This is Peru's submission for the Oscar for Best International Feature for this awards season. Leon did not rush into her main story right away. She slowly introduced us to Georgina and her peasant life in the slum community, with their ritualistic practices and celebrations. Those recurring images of Georgina and her young husband Leo (Lucio Rojas) trudging along the sandy slopes where their little house stood was quietly poignant as beautiful reflections of human drama. The way the young couple was given the runaround by the government bureaucracy was also rendered in poetic imagery, rather than the usual ugly grit we see in the usual poverty porn films. 8/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment