Amaren Eskuak (My mother’s hands) - Mireia Gabilondo (Spain 2013)
Nerea, thirty-eight-year-old mother who works in a daily newsroom, struggles to reconcile her family and professional life. From one day to the next the precarious balance finally falls to pieces when her mother, Luisa, is taken into hospital for memory loss. Nerea feels guilty for not having reacted earlier to the first symptoms of her mother's illness. Now she can only watch as Luisa goes back in time into the past. Nerea will learn part of her mother's hidden life and discover similarities in their experiences, stirring up the ghosts that live in the memories of both women.
As boas maneiras (Good manners) - Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra (Brazil 2017)
Filmmakers Juliana Rojas and Marco Dutra’s second collaboration (after the acclaimed Hard Labor) deftly integrates art-house and genre cinema to create a thrilling and dark gothic fable with sharp social commentary. Set in São Paulo, the film follows Clara, a lonely nurse from the outskirts of the city who is hired by mysterious and wealthy Ana to be the nanny of her soon to be born child. Against all odds, the two women develop a strong bond. But a fateful night marked by a full moon changes their plans. With powerful visuals and an impecable cinematography (by Zama’s Rui Poças), Good Manners is Disney meets Jacques Tourneur. The film becomes an unexpected and wild werewolf movie unlike any other, and a poignant social and racial allegory on modern-day Brazilian society.
Bienvenido Mister Kaita (Welcome mr. Kaita) - Albert Albacete and Helena Medina (Spain 2006)
Saggi Kaita, his wife and three children (born in Spain), along with his brother, Mahamadou, travel home to their village, Diabugu, Gambia, for the first time since they emigrated to Spain over ten years ago. The reason for the journey is the wedding of Mahamadou and the girl (now a woman) to whom he had become engaged before emigrating.
Press release for Bienvenido Mister Kaita
Carmen y Lola (Carmen and Lola) - Arantxa Echevarría (Spain 2018)
Arantxa Echevarria creates an impassioned love story both universal and sharply specific, following the blossoming romance of two young gypsy girls. Carmen and Lola find freedom in each other’s company as they experience a true sense of identity for the first time. But as their relationship grows deeper, they face fallout from Madrid’s traditional Roma community.
Cielo de Agua (heaven) - Margarita Poseck and Eugenia Poseck (Chile 2018)
Amidst millenary forests and surrounded by water, Bastien –the leading character– tells us what happened in her family of German settlers who once established themselves in the south of Chile. At times as a little girl and others as a teenager, she returns to the place where she spent her childhood, that happy time when she fell in love with Juan, the maid’s son. Juan and Bastien establish a star-crossed love and hasten events that will lead her family to make dramatic decisions and put an end to a romance that oversteps accepted standards.
La Invitación (Sleepover) - Susana Casares (Spain 2016)
Pushed by the fear of losing her friends, ten-year-old Silvia has invited them to a sleepover—but things can be complicated when your home is not exactly what your friends may call a home.
Los eternos indocumentados (The Eternally Undocumented) - Jennifer A. Cárcamo (UNITED STATES/El Salvador 2018)
Based on interviews with recently arrived Central Americans as well as interviews with organizers leading the struggle on the ground in Central America, this film captures the stories of Central American refugees and explores the root causes of forced migration. In the words of the late Salvadoran poet, Roque Dalton, as he says in his Poema de Amor, this film is about los Eternos Indocumentados(the Eternally Undocumented).
Miriam Miente (Miriam Lies)- Natalia Cabral and Oriol Estrada (DOMINICAN REPUBLIC/Spain 2018)
Miriam anxiously awaits the day of her fifteenth birthday party. Her family can't wait to meet Jean-Louis, her Internet boyfriend set to accompany her. But when Miriam sees Jean-Louis for the first time and realizes he's black, a quiet middle class world of good intentions will begin to crumble.
Mosquita y mari - Aurora Guerrero (United States 2012)
Mosquita y Mariis a coming of age story that focuses on a tender friendship between two young Chicanas. Yolanda and Mari are growing up in Huntington Park, Los Angeles and have only known loyalty to one thing: family. Growing up in immigrant households, both girls are expected to prioritize the well-being of their families. Yolanda, an only child, delivers straight A's and the hope of the American Dream while Mari, the eldest, shares economic responsibilities with her undocumented family who scrambles to make ends meet.
Real Women Have Curves - Patricia Cardoso (UNITED STATES 2002)
Ana, a first generation Mexican American teenager living in East Los Angeles, has just graduated from high school. Because she is a talented writer, a caring teacher urges her to apply to college. Ana secretly is excited about the possibility, but her overbearing and hypercritical mother, Carmen, insists that it is time for her to help provide for the family by working in her sister's sewing factory. When a crisis arises at the factory, it seems as if Ana's fate is unhappily sealed, but her indomitable will to reach beyond sweatshop life eventually leads her to burst, defiant and resplendent, through every restriction on her life.
Reencuentros: 2501 Migrantes (2501 Migrants: A Journey) - Yolanda Cruz (Mexico 2009)
The secluded, mountainous town of Teococuilco is virtually a ghost town. In search of work, 2500 of the town's previous inhabitants have left for other parts of Mexico and the United States. These migrant workers endured torturous days of travel through a barren desert to cross the border and work for years without seeing their loved ones. To honor the mostly overlooked lives of these migrant workers, the renowned Mexican artist Alejandro Santiago spent several years and close to a million dollars to fashion individual clay figures representing the workers. Alejandro hired a team of workers to aid him in the creation of this massive project, and through the sculptures, they honor the migrants who have left Teococuilco.
Tryouts - Susana Casares (UNITED STATEs 2013)
Being a teenager isn’t easy, especially for Nayla, a Muslim-American girl who wants to join her new high school’s cheerleading squad