Axis » Sheila Ilundain http://www.axisblog.com A Culture Movement Marketing Agency Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:55:53 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Latinos and Cinema http://www.axisblog.com/2009/08/new-york-international-latino-film-festival/ http://www.axisblog.com/2009/08/new-york-international-latino-film-festival/#comments Thu, 13 Aug 2009 14:36:50 +0000 Sheila Ilundain http://axisblog.com/?p=123 Last week, New York City was buzzing with the 10th anniversary of the New York International Latino Film Festival. On opening night, the festival’s founder, Dominican/Puerto Rican/New Yorker, Calixto Chinchilla, explained how his dream started with the desire to provide a forum to showcase the richness and capacity of Latino cinema. That first year, the →

]]> Last week, New York City was buzzing with the 10th anniversary of the New York International Latino Film Festival. On opening night, the festival’s founder, Dominican/Puerto Rican/New Yorker, Calixto Chinchilla, explained how his dream started with the desire to provide a forum to showcase the richness and capacity of Latino cinema. That first year, the festival was held in a little room, over a cuchifrito, with some VHS tapes, and folding chairs filled with eager supporters of his dream. Now 10 years later, he’s screening the films of big name artists such as Benjamin Bratt, Andy Garcia, Vin Diesel, and John Leguizamo, while holding panel discussions, such as “Latinos in America” with the presence of influencers Soledad O’Brien, Rosie Perez, Luis Guzman and Lauren Velez. The five-day festival has countless of other Latino actors, screenwriters, directors, and producers, who have names yet to be discovered, but who have graced the festival with their talent, honor, pride, instinct, flair, creativity, and love for film, and our culture.

My favorite film was screened on Dominican Night, one of the festival’s most popular night and was written and directed by East LA’s own Cruz Angeles, but set in Brooklyn. It’s a teenage love story between a boy from a Mexican immigrant family, and a girl from Dominican parents. For me it exemplified the richness, commonality, and differences in our culture. If you have a chance to ever catch it, it’s a great movie. Over 125 films, shorts, documentaries and panels were part of Calixto’s dream this 10th year around. And he was beside himself. The cuchifrito place was gone, but the supporters and love for Latino film were still there, and will still be there for years to come.

untitled.jpg

]]> http://www.axisblog.com/2009/08/new-york-international-latino-film-festival/feed/ 0