Del Toro comes for a ‘Pan’s Labyrinth’ 20th Anniversary Screening while Cuarón is attending his son Jonas Cuarón’s ‘Campeón Gabacho,’ which opens the fest and which he produced. Luna's 'Ashes' plays in Official Selection At least two of the Tres Amigos are attending the 24th Morelia International Film Festival (FICM) this year, with Guillermo del Toro breezing into town to toast the 20th anniversary of his iconic “Pan’s Labyrinth” while Cuarón attends opening night film “Campeón Gabacho” by his son Jonas Cuarón, which he produced. The fest will be missing the third Amigo, Alejandro González Iñárritu, whose “Digger” has earned close to a million dollars since its debut on Oct. 1 in Mexico, according to National Film Chamber, Canacine.
Star power is also in the official selection, which includes Diego Luna’s latest directorial outing ‘Ashes’ as well as those of Rodrigo Plá (“The Zone”), Fernando Tovar (“Sad Girlz,” “Suena”) and Nathalia Acevedo (“Post Tenebras Lux”). Bayona leads the jury for Mexican features that includes Basque filmmaker Jaione Camborda, Grammy-winning Mexican composer Gabriela Ortiz and U.S. director-producer Amy Redford. Swiss documentarian Alexandre O.
Philippe, film critic Jonathan Romney and Mexico’s Juan Carlos Rulfo comprise the Mexican documentary jury. Morelia will also showcase a bevy of acclaimed international films, led by Martin McDonagh’s “Wild Horse Nine,” which garnered John Malkovich a Venice Volpi Cup for Best Actor and Spain’s submission to the Oscars, “La bola negra” by Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi. For artistic director Daniela Michel one of the biggest changes at the festival in recent years has been introducing a hybrid format that allows access to part of the program online.
We wanted moviegoers to be able to discover and enjoy the films competing in our 2020 edition, despite the lockdown. It was imperative that these Mexican films reach their audience even if people weren’t going to movie theaters.” “We realized that making part of the Official Selection available online—particularly the Mexican short films in competition—would give greater visibility to the work of up-and-coming talents in Mexican cinema and would also provide a great opportunity for audiences who cannot travel to Morelia to experience the FICM.” Reflecting on the trends in Mexican cinema over the past five years, she said: “What has changed mostly is the representation of certain issues in Mexican culture. We have seen in recent years more films oriented towards more intimate subjects like family issues, childhood, and motherhood.
We have also seen a broader representation of the Mexican middle class at home. Those films have had a very profound impact on Mexican audiences because, through the films, they have seen a very accurate and tender representation of their own lives.” The good news is that there are female directors in the industry. Women have been gaining more and more ground, and I’m really happy about that because a few years ago there were almost no female directors in Mexican cinema, and now there are so many—many of whom have won awards in Morelia.” But challenges remain.
As with most of the festivals across Mexico, FICM faced cutbacks in funding from corporate and institutional sponsors. Fortunately, we are a team of perfectionists and people who are deeply passionate about their work, which has allowed us to successfully overcome these challenges.” “The challenges have changed over the course of these 24 years. At first, the main challenge was to build an audience for the types of films that made up the festival in 2003: Mexican short films and documentaries.
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