The Global Hispanic World: A Celebration Through Film

With a generous grant from Pragda, the leading educational film distributor for the newest Latin American, Spanish, and Latinx cinema, the Latin American & Latinx Studies Program is sponsoring “The Global Hispanic World: A Celebration through Film,” a Fall 2024 Virtual Film Festival.

From September 9 – October 15, 2024, the Adelphi community will have access to FIVE acclaimed international films that cover important topics such as environmental tourism in Bolivia, the survival of indigenous communities in Oaxaca, Mexico, Jewish-Islamic relations in Spain, immigration youth experience in NYC, and sex-trade in the Dominican Republic.

The Fall Film Festival will be virtual allowing the Adelphi community and beyond to experience the diversity of Hispanic culture, interact with the past and present societal issues, and gain insights into countries, regions, and collective memory.

Upcoming Screenings

Nudo Mixteco

September 15-20, 2024

Taking place in a rural Mixtec village in Oaxaca, southern Mexico, Nudo Mixteco follows the return of María, Esteban, and Toña, each from a different direction. Each of them has a different reason for coming back, just like each had a different reason to leave in the first place. However, all three face a confrontation that will force a turning point in their lives.

María buries her mother, her father rejects her, and in uncertainty, she asks her childhood love, Piedad, to leave with her. Esteban returns after three years to discover that Chabela, his wife, is living with another man. Enraged he calls the village people to prosecute her in an assembly. Toña, faced with her daughter’s abuse, relives her own pain when she returns to confront her family to protect her.

Narrated from the point of view of the women, the three stories momentarily intersect with each other and together paint an exceptional picture of the local culture, in which filmmaker Ángeles Cruz herself grew up. Festivities, rituals, and a village council that acts as a tribunal – these elements make up the fabric of a community that should offer protection, warmth, and security. However, the fates of the three protagonists will reveal a constant fight against age-old patriarchal power and prejudice.

Home is Somewhere Else

September 22 – September 27, 2024

An estimated 11 million undocumented migrants are living in the United States under the constant threat of sudden deportation. What is it like to grow up in such a situation?

Home is Somewhere Else shares the rich complexity of the emotional experiences of immigrant children and families to better understand and empathize with them. It invites discussion about the need for a new US migratory model based on respect for human rights for all.

In this documentary animation, three young immigrants tell their stories. Eleven-year-old Jasmine fears being separated from her undocumented parents and sets off to become an activist to protect families like her own. Sisters Evelyn and Elizabeth. Evelyn was born in the USA but has chosen to return to Mexico, while her sister Elizabeth, an illegal immigrant in Los Angeles, is struggling to realize her ambitions. Finally, Lalo shares the story of his childhood, deportation experience, finding a way back, and transforming his challenges through his work as an artist and activist.

Voiced by the actual children and their families, the stories are woven together by spoken word poet José Eduardo Aguilar, also known as Lalo “El Deportee,” the film’s host and MC whose vibrant “Spanglish” breaks codes, switches standards, and pushes the viewer to decipher his poems. Their painful experiences and vibrant hopes and dreams lend themselves well to animation. A powerful reminder of how the color of your passport determines your life.

Alegría

September 29 – October 4, 2024

Alegría’s life takes a profound shift upon discovering that her orthodox Jewish brother insists on holding his daughter’s wedding in Melilla. Guided by Dunia, her Arab housekeeper, and Marian, her Christian confidante, Alegría embarks on a journey to connect with her roots while assisting her niece, Yael, in navigating womanhood within a highly conservative male-dominated environment.

Renowned Mexican actress Cecilia Suárez (The House of Flowers, 3 Caminos) takes the lead, infusing the film with her charisma and impeccable comedic timing, amidst a backdrop of familial tumult and conflicting traditions. The film sensitively depicts her coming to terms with her roots and the cultural past she has rejected. She may not want these traditions for herself, but she comes to understand the value they have in her community.

Alegría is also about Melilla, an autonomous, multicultural Spanish city on Africa’s north coast, where Jews, Muslims, and Christians mix and mingle and come together to make the wedding happen. It is a gorgeous evocation of a fascinating and beautiful corner of the world not often seen on-screen.

Shaped entirely by women – from the director and screenwriters to the producer, director Violeta Salama follows in the footsteps of esteemed directors like Nadine Labaki in Lebanon (notably with Caramel), Mira Nadir in India, and Leila Marraki in Morocco.

Boca Chica

October 6-11, 2024

Beautifully juxtaposing the realities and expectations of a young girl approaching womanhood in the Dominican Republic, Boca Chica shines a light on the insidious child sex trade and the lives it seeks to destroy.

Director Gabriella A. Moses exposes the community’s complicity by way of twelve-year-old Desi who is constantly exposed to unwanted advances and crude comments from older men, both visiting and homegrown. She works at the family restaurant alongside her mother Carmen, who encourages the behavior, in a once serene beachside town now bustling with foreign tourists.

Music is Desi’s escape. She dreams of parlaying her nascent musical talents into a full-fledged singing career. When she stumbles across a group of local rappers that set themselves apart from the scene, her passions begin to boil to the surface. She seeks to avoid the common fate of growing mature before her time and falling prey to the morally bankrupt adults in her life who encourage her to forgo her innocence for profit.

Boca Chica explores themes of identity, family, codependency, and truth, and exposes how local social norms present the sexualization of very young girls as a path to survival.

Sun and Daughter

October 13-18, 2024

Ten-year-old Lucía’s family lives in the Island of the Sun (Isla del Sol) in the middle of Lake Titicaca in Bolivia; a place that’s as mystical as it is picturesque. When her father breaks from their routine one morning and leaves for the city to make money, Lucía finds it difficult to cope with his absence, building her daily life around the expectations of their reunion.

After school, Lucía and her younger sister Maribel weave Totora reeds into figurines that her mother sells to numerous tourists. But the rhythm of life on the island and the passage of time help her realize her father is no longer the person she longed to have back. She must find her own path. Lucía is thinking of going to the city herself, but she has no money. It’s time she took her destiny into her own hands.

With a subtle commentary on environmental tourism and the exploitation of “the other” that goes two-way, Catalina Razzini’s touching rural tale masterly captures the landscape of Isla del Sol in Sun and Daughter.

Film Access

For Film access, general questions, or if any faculty is interested in including festival films in their courses, please contact Giovani Burgos, director of the Latin American and Latinx Studies program, at gburgos@adelphi.edu for details.

Sponsors

Proudly sponsored by the Latin American and Latinx Studies Program, the College of Continuing and Professional Studies and Pragda.