70 Anos Esta Noite

A documentary film about the taboos, stereotypes, and struggles of black actors in Brazilian television "soaps". Based on his own memories and on a sturdy body of research evidence, the director analyses race relations in Brazilian soap operas, calling attention to their likely influence on Brazilian African-Americans' identity-forming processes.

Can flipping through the channels change your life? For Karen, a former prosecutor living in Chicago, her world changed forever when she accidentally fell in love with telenovelas. Now she has quit her job, and she's moving to Mexico City to write the telenovela she's always wanted to watch.

Love Thing captures the emerging multicultural spirit and personal freedom of the late 1970s with an outrageous attitude and experimental style. A work in progress now finally completed it's the last American musical comedy from that era which can be viewed today as a prophetic satire. Through its provocative, entertaining storyline highlighted by song and dance, the movie answers the burning question of our time, "What happens after the marriage?

A deliciously dramtic telenovela short film. The 7th Tickle Gang film produced for a 48-hour film festival.

Chiquititas: Teatro Gran Rex 2006

Four ambitious and beautiful young women. From four very different corners of Mexico. Just like hundreds of others, they are caught up in the frenzy that sweeps the nation when Alejandro Mateos, one of the country's most powerful producers, dreams up a nationwide talent search to cast the lead in his next big movie.

Set ten years after the finale's quintuple wedding, the special portrays the happily reunited San Román family, including four new grandchildren, as well as the Xochimilco residents. The San Románs go to Patricia's lake cabin in order to celebrate their shared ten-year wedding anniversary, unaware that Demetrio, whom they believe died after escaping from prison a year prior, is actually alive and well and is conspiring with his grandson, Ángel and Alma's young son Angelito, and the San Román grandchildren's nanny, Diana, to kill the entire family.

José, a street performer who dreams about becoming a telenovela star, is recruited by a talent manager who promises him great success, but soon realizes the job is actually dancing in a gay strip club. Away from his home and enjoying the newfound fame he has acquired with his new job in the city, José starts wondering if turning his back on his family and himself is worth it now that he's the club's biggest star, nicknamed "El Pistolero."

Ana Maria is having a bad day until she magically switches places with the main character of her favorite telenovela. As she struggles to escape from Novela Land, Ana Maria finally understands why her real life was such a mess.

In love with Brazil and Maria, a soap opera heroin harassed by a corrupt contractor, Abdelinho suffers parallel ordeal in Morocco by pressure of Amr Taleb, a dogmatic, moralistic priest, enforcing religious purity on the community

Two identical twin sisters, separated at birth, one truly decent but humble, the other ultra rich, conniving, and truly destructive. They soon find themselves hopelessly intertwined in each other's lives.

After a surprising revelation, Leonor Alejandra del Campo and Sebastián Castillo Mendoza will finally talk about their feelings.

The real life story of Andres Lopez Lopez aka "Frecita" during his years involved with the Colombian Cartel aka "Cartel Norte del Valle"

The film recounts the life of the prisoners and the problems their families encounter in their struggle to survive. Here again filmmaker Kamran Shirdel employs the cinema verité style. The interviews with the prisoners, social workers and teachers serve as commentaries for "constructed" documentary images.

Tehran Is the Capital of Iran (1966-79) documents life in a deprived district in the south of Tehran. The images of destitution in Tehran's poor areas is accompanied by a variety of spoken accounts: the official viewpoint on the district's living conditions, what the inhabitants have to say, and occasional extracts read out of school manuals. The key element in Shirdel's film is the counterpoint effect he creates with image and sound. His impressively powerful portrayal of social unease helps reinforce the impact of his astonishing documentary images and social themes.

Contrasting ancient myth and modern reality, this short documentary examines the legendary relationship between West Coast Indigenous people and salmon, once their staple food. In the mythical realm, we learn how Raven finds riches in the harvest of the salmon, only to lose everything through a thoughtless act against the Spirit of the Salmon. So too does modern man jeopardize his living from the sea by heedless action. Images of ancient spear-fishing and smoke-houses contrast with images of today's Indigenous people operating a seiner and working in a cooperative cannery.

Short documentary filmed at the 1995 Burning Man festival

Tío Jess

Rubem Braga: Olho as Nuvens Vagabundas

In 1952, Marie-Louise Chapelle was the first French woman to reach an unclimbed peak in the Himalayas. Years later, filmmaker Ellen Vermeulen follows in her footsteps. An intimate journey through snow landscapes in which personal ambitions, social constraints, and the complexity of being a woman take center stage.