Latinos & Sundance: We seem to get closer to a bolder vision of Latino representation

The way we uplift and discuss Latino representation in art is starting to shift.  With film and TV having the largest set of eyes to measure, it is important to discuss a staple in the conveyor belt of Hollywood. The latest Sundance Film Festival is, for this metaphor, an essential part of the Latinos-in-film and TV assembly line. 

A 10-hour drive or a short flight for some, the festival, in its 40th anniversary, showcased debuts from Latino filmmakers and flew in our favorite Latino actors to Utah like Pedro Pascal and Melissa Barrera. Now in its fifth year, the Latinx House also hosted several events for Latine/o attendees of the festival. In comparison to last year alone, this festival had far more representation and dared to ask the question: Can Latino representation be more complex, more nuanced and more provocative?  

A major festival after the strikes and during a heated award season 

Before I step into my festival favorites, I need to address the current atmosphere of this representation conversation and where this year can take us. In the last few years, reports by UCLA, USC, and Congressional offices like Joaquin Castro have recommended studios, executives and audiences to give Latino voices a shot in film and TV. All the reports link to a small representation of Latinos both behind and in front of the camera. Many of the promises and commitments that major studios and production companies have made since 2020 have not been met, according to Latino representation advocacy groups.

Last summer, Latino representation advocacy groups penned an open letter to address the strikes and how a rule from unions to not promote was affecting Latino releases. Latino advocacy groups like the Alliance of Latinx Executives, the Latino Film Institute, and the National Association of Latino Independent Producers among many others wrote about their shared legacies, commitments, and visions for Latino representation amid a historic strike that is set to reshape the living conditions of artists on the margins of this industry. [A robust comprehension is needed to understand how all of these organizations supported and contributed to the early-stage production and cultural impact of several Latino-led projects in the last few years.] 

In the conclusion of the letter they write: 

“For the sake of current and future generations of Latinos, we will not delay our progress any longer. We invite you to join us in our effort to amplify the work that countless Latino artists have worked so hard to create. It’s important that we show up for them at a time when they are not able to promote their projects.”

All the major studio releases during the dual strike were hurt but the letter as it notes made Latino-made and Latino-led releases and the markers of their success the collateral damage of this. With Warner Bros. delaying projects like “Dune Part 2,” and MGM Studios delaying Luca Guadagnino’s “Challengers” until after the strike- it is clear that they see the potential in allowing their stars and writers to promote a film. Projects like “Blue Beetle,” “A Million Miles Away" and new TV series like “Primo” and the latest season of “This Fool” didn’t get the opportunity to promote their projects and have projected low box office numbers and opening ratings due to it.

Now with Sundance kicking off 2024,an awards season in full gear and a post-strike hungry media atmosphere, there is potential for Latino voices to froth up this year. With America Ferrera's Oscar nomination for Supporting Actress Academy for “Barbie” and Pedro Pascal’s numerous nominations for his performance in the “Last of Us,” Latino representation in this country alone is at a critical juncture.  

The idea of representation should also be categorized between national U.S. projects and international discourse and this is where Sundance truly comes in. 

Here are some Latino films from the Sundance Festival:

Igualada [Colombia]

The majority of the discourse in the U.S. about Colombia has unfortunately been about the drug trade and the lore of organized crime. Growing up, my mom helped launch a Colombian restaurant in Orange County and it was through that experience that I learned the long history of Colombian culture and resistance. Films like “Birds of Passage” by Co-Directors Ciro Guerra and Cristina Gallego show that aspect of Colombian culture and have circulated the independent art circuit but have not gotten the same notoriety in the way a show like “Narcos” on Netflix has. In Juan Mejia Botero's Sundance 2024 documentary,“Igualada,” Afro-Colombian organizer and presidential candidate Francia Márquez, we get to see a Colombia that has long been forgotten by Western audiences. 

Throughout the film, Mejia Botero weaves between 15-year old interviews, b-roll and archives with present-day footage of her latest race for Colombia’s presidential race. From La Toma, which is north of Suarez, Cauca, her home is in a community that has been affected by ancestral mining and agriculture with historic forms of displacement that have been going on since her ancestors were there from Africa as slaves. Throughout the film, we learn about how her community has been struggling historically to reclaim their land rights and how even on brief stints away from her home to conduct political organizing, her own mother’s land is stripped away.

We meet Márquez as a young leader in her rural town and stay with her as we also see her 2021 campaign’s slogan, “I am Because We Are” come to life. Her campaign staff, volunteers and supporters are a part of the story in ways visual narratives about movements should be told. Many political documentaries provide you with interviews by pundits, former staff, researchers and the candidate themselves progressively telling you multiple angles to a story. What “Igualada” is able to do is frame the story around more than just one face but provide a full scope of the  world of where Colombia has been for Afro-Colombians and where it could go with the leadership that Márquez represents. 

Many recent political documentaries tell the importance of a candidate by using footage from protests and riots that have now become diluted or even overused in order to tell a story of racial persecution. The way “Igualada” documents and weaves between protests, riots and political demonstrations is unique because it helps document the last few years of the pandemic in Colombia and how the most vulnerable there have persevered, and shows to audiences who have not see that country through the perspective of Afro-Latinos. These images and stories are essential to the visual and historical lexicon of Latino/e representation.

In the Summers [New Mexico] 

As a community, there has been a need to tell unapologetically complicated stories about unapologetic complicated characters. The mere representation of Latinidad or Latino-ness should be assumed or even irrelevant. Does the character only need to speak Spanglish or what about needing cholos or hot cheetos? The solution to this endangering trap Latino films have, especially Latino-American films, is Alessandra Lacorazza Samudio’s debut feature "In the Summers."

Set throughout three different chapters and stages of life, the film tells the story of two sisters, Eva (Luciana Elisa Quinonez) and Violeta (Dreya Castillo), who every summer visit their dad in New Mexico. Calle 13’s Residente, who plays the complex father, Vicente (Renè Pérez Joglar) opens the film as a young father estranged from his two daughters. They don’t go to Quinceñeras, eat albondigas or eat hot cheetos by the way. Jokes aside, the film tells a very intimate and difficult story about how two young people react to a parent and how all of their choices overlap into a film that will make you wonder and realize, we have not seen a story about two Latinas in the United States told this way.

Over the last few decades, feminist scholars of color, bell hooks as the most popular and even Sandra Cisneros have written about the relationship femininity, gender performance and of course masculinity have with each other. In “The Will to Change,” hooks writes : “To heal, men must learn to feel again. They must learn to break the silence, to speak the pain.” What Joglar aka Residente is able to do with the character of Vicente is portray a harboring ache and need to break that silence. So much of the character’s masculinity for many Latino families is relatable to me as I’ve seen many men in my family ache to tell their truths with hardly any avenues to do so. We see the consequences of Vicente’s own heartbreak throughout the story and wonder what the root cause of it is and if his daughters can be the solution. 

In conversation with films like “Aftersun,” “Everything, Everywhere All at once” and “Moonlight,”  and MOONLIGHT, this film is set to make waves this year. It is no surprise that “In the Summer” won the highest prizes at the festival.

Frida [Mexico & USA]

If you’re from Los Angeles you likely, I hope, grew up going to Amoeba Records on Sunset Boulevard that has since become an immersive museum of Picasso’s work and I find it to be the perfect example of the state of art. Before ever taking a Chicana/o Studies class or even an art class, knowing who Frida Kahlo is, is like knowing what the Super Bowl is. For Emmy-nominated and Oscar-nominated editor turned first-time director Carla Guiterrez, it is a daring challenge to choose to tell the story of one of the most famous painters in the world, but I believe this to be an important piece on the lexicon of key figure biographies of not just Latinos but our society as a whole. 

When someone is no longer here, we keep and share their memory and at times, share their best attributes only as to save or preserve legacy. Sometimes we need to demand why, especially when it’s the legacy we try to protect as a status quo and in this case, protecting a system of capital. 

Frida Kahlo is on everything.

Importantly, Frida Kahlo is a symbol of Mexican pride, tradition, resilience and womanhood and femininity. Dig deeper and to the art history nerd, the proud Chicana or the painter, she is a symbol of determination, of self-understanding and of a high craft. Carla Gutierrez does not disagree with any of that. The documentary honors the story of who this woman was and is. The details linger with you when the film ends and you can’t help but wonder, wait, the documentary got away with that? And it was entertaining? 

The paintings, the doodles, the sketches and the diary entries, all that Frida Kahlo touched with her hands become alive in this documentary. I’m sure Amazon will have a massive rollout for it and I hope that I get to watch it in theaters with some California Cabernet because the film is a sight and an experience. Using animators and delicate editing, we get to genuinely feel Frida Kahlo’s life and how it deeply informed her process. 

I’m grateful for Latino Cinema and I’m grateful for Sundance

The truth is, not that long ago, I didn’t even know what Sundance was. When I first heard about it to tell you the truth at some industry mixer, I went along with it and googled what it was in the bathroom. I’m grateful to friends in the industry who helped me get access to the festival. And for organizations who are currently holding industries accountable in order t o give people access to this festival. The three films I profiled weren’t all I saw, but they are what I would recommend to people needing their Latino representation fix because these films do that and much, much more.