Ariel Awards 2009

2009 Ariel Awards
2009 Ariel nominations: Feb. 27, 2009
2009 Ariel winners: National Auditorium in Mexico City on March 31, 2009
("*" denotes the winner in each category)
 

Fernando Eimbcke’s minimalist comedy Lake Tahoe presents a series of vignettes showing a small-town teenager (Diego Cataño) trying to cope with the death of his father. Lake Tahoe won three Ariels: best film, best director, and best supporting actor (Héctor Herrera). The night’s biggest winner, however, was Rodrigo Plá’s drama Desierto adentro, set during Mexico’s Cristero War, with eight awards including best actor (Mario Zaragoza) and best original screenplay. Box-office hit Arrancame la vida / Tear This Heart Out, Mexico’s submission for the 2009 foreign-language film Academy Award, failed to get a best picture nod [...]

by Anna Robinson | March 31, 2009   
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BABEL: Great To Be Nominated

The 2006 Best Picture nominee Babel is the next feature in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences‘ "Great To Be Nominated" series. Screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga and director Alejandro González Iñárritu’s multi-language, globe-spanning drama will be screened on Monday, August 11, at 7:30 p.m. at the Academy’s Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills.
Following the screening, producer Steve Golin, cast member Aaron Spears, and sound rerecording mixers Chris Minkler and Jon Taylor will take part in a discussion about the film.
In Babel, one tragic event in the Moroccan desert reverberates across the globe, reaching the United States, Mexico, and Japan. Among those involved in this international tangle are Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Rinko Kikuchi, Adriana Barraza, Gael García Bernal, [...]

by Andre Soares | August 4, 2008   
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STELLET LICHT Clip

Writer-director Carlos Reygadas‘ Stellet licht / Silent Night deals with the conflicts faced by a devout married Mennonite after he falls in love with another woman.
Stellet licht was one of the many acclaimed films that I missed at the 2007 AFI FEST in Los Angeles. The film shared the Cannes Film Festival’s Jury Prize with Persepolis and was Mexico’s submission for the 2008 foreign-language film Oscar (though it failed to land a nomination).
Earlier this year, Stellet licht won five Ariel Awards, including best film, director, and screenplay.
The clip below was posted by elpezleta.
 

 
PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK Clip
Julie Andrews in THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE Clip
LOLA MONTÈS Clip
MON ONCLE Clip
THE OFFICIAL STORY Clip
Bette Davis Sings "What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?"
PATHFINDER Clip
C.R.A.Z.Y. [...]

by Andre Soares | May 6, 2008   
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Tito Guízar Centennial Tribute at Downtown Los Angeles’ Million Dollar Theater

 

 
Tito Guízar Centennial Tribute Tonight
Charlton Heston
JELLYFISH: Q&A with Etgar Keret
STRANGE CULTURE: Q&A with Lynn Hershman-Leeson, Steve Kurtz, and Lucia Sommer
Budd Schulberg, David Chase Writers Guild Salute
Clarence Brown, Forgotten Film Director
Paul Scofield
Arthur C. Clarke and the Making of 2001
Anthony Minghella Appreciation in the WASHINGTON POST
Ramon Novarro Photo Montage and THE PAGAN Clip
Edmund Goulding: Q&A with Biographer Matthew Kennedy
 

by Andre Soares | April 8, 2008   
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Tito Guízar Centennial Tribute Tonight

The Cervantes Center of Arts & Letters will celebrate the birth centennial of Mexican actor-singer superstar Tito Guízar (1908–1999) with a screening of the 1936 cowboy musical ("charro") Alla en el rancho grande / Over at the Big Ranch this evening at 7pm at USC’s Leavey Library Auditorium in downtown Los Angeles. Free admission. (Parking at Figueroa St. – Gate # 3; for more information/RSVP.: 310 526 1480.)
The film will be presented in Spanish with English subtitles. Following the screening, Guízar’s daughter and son, actress Lilia Guízar and singer Tito Guízar Jr., will take part in a q&a session.
Directed by Fernando de Fuentes, Over at the Big Ranch stars Guízar, Esther Fernandez, Rene Cardona, Emma Roldan, Chaflan, Lorenzo Barcelata, and [...]

by Andre Soares | April 8, 2008   
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Ariel Awards 2008

2008 Ariel Awards
2008 Ariel nominations: February 21, 2008
2008 Ariel winners: Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City on March 25, 2008
("*" denotes the winner in each category)
 

Writer-director Carlos Reygadas‘ drama Stellet licht / Luz silenciosa was the big winner at the 50th Ariel Awards, taking home statuettes for best film, director, original screenplay, supporting actress (María Pankratz), and cinematography (Alexis Zabé). Stellet licht, which shared the Jury Prize at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival, is set in a Mennonite community where a married man falls in love with another woman.

Also at the 50th Ariel Awards ceremony, veteran Silvia Pinal, 76, the star of Luis Buñuel’s Viridiana (above), The Exterminating Angel, and Simon of the Desert, was given a Golden [...]

by Andre Soares | March 25, 2008   
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PAN’S LABYRINTH d: Guillermo del Toro

El Laberinto del fauno / Pan’s Labyrinth (2006)
Direction and screenplay: Guillermo del Toro. Cast: Ivana Baquero, Sergi López, Maribel Verdú, Doug Jones, Ariadna Gil, Álex Angulo, Manolo Solo
 

OFELIA’S ADVENTURES IN WEIRDLAND
This review contains spoilers. Proceed at your own risk.
"If you expect to get laid after this screening," filmmaker Guillermo del Toro told the midnight (actually, closer to 1 a.m.) audience at the AFI FEST Los Angeles premiere of Pan’s Labyrinth, "it ain’t gonna happen." Indeed, del Toro’s "adult fairytale" is hardly the sort of fable that would induce either sexual or romantic yearnings. The story of a young girl who attempts to escape the brutal repression of General Francisco Franco’s Spain by creating her own dark fantasy world, Pan’s Labyrinth [...]

by Andre Soares | October 6, 2007   
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Ariel Awards – 2007 Winners

Guillermo del Toro’s dark fairy-tale El Laberinto del fauno / Pan’s Labyrinth was the big winner at the Mexican Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences‘ 49th Ariel Awards ceremony held at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City on Mar. 20.
Set in the 1940s, the Mexican-Spanish co-production about a young girl’s entry into a fantastic world — so as to escape from the oppressive reality of General Franco’s Fascist Spain — won a total of 9 awards (out of 12 nominations), including best film and best director.
As a steely houseworker who befriends the young girl, Maribel Verdú (top) shared the best actress award with Elizabeth Cervantes, who plays a businesswoman and mother with little luck in love [...]

by Andre Soares | March 24, 2007   
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Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival Awards 2006

2006 Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival Awards
2006 Huelva Ibero-American Film Festival: Huelva, Andalucia, Spain, between November 18-25, 2006
 

 
Colón de Oro for Best Feature / mejor largometraje: El violín / The Violin by Francisco Vargas Quevedo (Mexico)
Special Jury Prize / Premio Especial del Jurado: Páginas del diario de Mauricio by Manuel Pérez (Cuba, Spain and Mexico)
Colón de Plata for best director / mejor director: Alejandro Doria for Las manos / The Hands (Spain and Argentina)
Carabela de Plata for best new director / mejor director novel: Jorge Durán for Proibido Proibir / Forbidden to Forbid (Brazil, Chile and Spain)
Colón de Plata for best actor / mejor actor: Jesús Aranda for Chicha tu madre (Peru and Argentina)
Colón de Plata for best [...]

by Andre Soares | November 25, 2006   
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Lupita Tovar Tribute

At one point known as Mexico’s Sweetheart, Lupita Tovar had a surprisingly brief film career. Apart from a handful of films in the early 1930s, including the Spanish version of Dracula and the Mexican classic Santa, Tovar worked only sporadically in motion pictures.
In Hollywood, she either played in Spanish-language versions of American films, or appeared in minor roles in regular studio fare.
I spoke with her once — while doing research on the life of fellow Mexican Ramon Novarro — and ran into her a couple of times at UCLA and at the Samuel Goldwyn Theatre in Beverly Hills. Both times Tovar was accompanied by film historian Bob Dickson, who greatly assisted me in my research. Bob is the co-author [...]

by Andre Soares | November 9, 2006   
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INNOCENT VOICES by Luis Mandoki

Voces inocentes / Innocent Voices (2004)
Director: Luis Mandoki. Screenplay: Luis Mandoki and Oscar Torres, inspired by Torres’ real-life experiences. Cast: Carlos Padilla, Leonor Varela, Ofelia Medina, Gustavo Muñoz, Daniel Giménez Cacho
 
HELL ON EARTH
Voces inocentes / Innocent Voices is a powerful film because of its depiction of the lives of children, women, and men, during El Salvador’s bloody civil war. From a cinematic standpoint, however, Luis Mandoki’s direction relies a little too much on melodramatic closeups and on cute pre-teen shenanigans that detract from the story’s harrowing truth.
Set during El Salvador’s civil war in the 1980s, Voces inocentes tells the story of a young boy (Carlos Padilla) who must decide between joining the local leftist guerrillas or the U.S. sponsored [...]

by Andre Soares | March 20, 2005   
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Ariel Awards 2004

47th Ariel Awards – 2004
The Mexican Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ 47th Ariel winners were announced on March 29, 2005.
("*" denotes the winner in each category)
 

Writer-director Fernando Eimbcke’s feature-film debut, Temporada de patos / Duck Season, depicts the growing pains of a handful of adolescents as they spend one long (and black-and-white) Sunday’s journey into adulthood. In the cast: Enrique Arreola, Diego Cataño, Daniel Miranda, Danny Perea, Carolina Politi, and Alfredo Escobar.
 
Film
Manos libres (Nadie te habla) – Producciones Tragaluz / Fidecine
* Temporada de patos / Duck Season – Lulú Producciones / Fidecine
Voces inocentes / Innocent Voices – Altavista Films
Iberian / Iberoamerican Film
Machuca by Andrés Wood (Chile)
Te doy mis ojos by Icíar Bollaín (Spain)
* [...]

by Andre Soares | March 15, 2005   
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