Film festival
San Luis event features shorts competition
SAN LUIS, Ariz. — The San Luis Film Festival has pursued two goals in its six years of existence.
One has been exposing area residents to independent feature films and documentaries produced on both sides of the border. The other has been raising the city’s profile as an artistic and cultural mecca.
Now in its seventh year, the festival has yet another mission: cultivating the talents of area residents who dream of making films.
Aspiring filmmakers from Yuma County are invited to enter their efforts in a regional short film competition that is new to the festival, this year slated for Nov. 13-16 at the Cesar Chavez Cultural Center in San Luis, 1015 N. Main St.
Also new will be a fourhour cinematography workshop to be taught on the final day of the festival by a director still to be confirmed.
For the first time a year ago, the festival featured a short film competition that was open to entries from around the globe. This year, the competition is being split into two categories, with the addition of a regional competition in efforts to encourage more local participation, says Antonio Carrillo, the festival’s director and co-founder.
The regional competition is open to any current or aspiring filmmakers living in Yuma, Imperial counties, San Luis Rio Colorado, Son., or Mexicali, Baja Calif.
Entries can be a documentary or fiction film in any genre, in lengths of a least three minutes and no more than 10 minutes, Carrillo said.
“It can be any project,” he said. “As long as it comes in the format of a video, we do not (limit) the media they use.”
To enter the regional competition, go to the festival website, www.sanluisfilmfestival.com.
Deadlines for entries in the regional competition is Oct. 6.
Entry fees for the regional competition are $15 for students at any academic institution and $30 for non-students, although a 50 percent discount may be available. For more information about discounts, send an email to sanluisfilmfestival@ gmail.com.
For information about attending the cinematography workshop, visit the website www.sanluisfilmfestival.com.
One critically acclaimed documentary film will be shown on each of the four nights of the festival.
There is no charge to see documentaries, although the public is asked to download a free ticket that allows festival organizers to document attendance for purposes of recruiting sponsors. To download a ticket, go to the festival website.
The documentaries are either in English or Spanish, but all films have subtitles, Carrillo said.
“La Libertad del Diablo” (“The Devil’s Freedom”) will be shown at 6 p.m. Nov. 13 at the Cesar Chavez Cultural Center. This Spanishlanguage film portrays the violence that has gripped Mexico in recent years from the perspectives of both victims and their aggressors. Directed by Everardo Gonzalez, the film is the winner of Mexico’s Ariel Award for best documentary.
“Flex is Kings,” an English-language film, follows a group of Brooklyn youths as they establish themselves as practitioners of the acrobatic dance
style known as “flexing.” Directed by Deidre School and Michael Beach Nichols, this winner of 2013 Tribeca Film Festival honors screens at 6 p.m. on Nov. 14.
The life of Costa Rican singer Chavela Vargas is the subject of “Chavela,” a documentary that will be shown Nov. 15 at 6 p.m. Directors are Catherine Gund and Daresha Kyi.
The final night’s film will be “Adios Amor,” a documentary in both languages about the life of Maria Moreno, a farm labor organizer whose union efforts in the 1950s and ‘60s far predated those of Cesar Chavez. The film directed by Laurie Coyle will be shown at 6 p.m. on Nov. 16.
Carrillo said the directors of each of the four documentaries are all confirmed to attend the festival on the nights their films are shown. Following the screenings, they will take questions from the audience.
Sponsors of the festival are the city of San Luis, Ruben Walshe, Nieves Riedel, the Mexican Consulate in Yuma, Arizona Community Foundation and Regional Center for Border Health.