Twenty years after filmmaker Luis Buñuel made the surrealist classic Un Chien Andalou with Salvador Dali, he fell in love with Mexico, relinquished his Spanish citizenship, and spent the rest of his life making movies there. Mexico has always had a rich cinema history, from the Golden Age of the 1940s to the sexicomedias of the 1970s to the recent New Mexican Cinema of Amores Perros and Y Tu Mamá También.
This years Hola Mexico Film Festival, which runs in six U.S. cities, marks the bicentennial of Mexican Independence. It fires up in Miami this Thursday with a short film program titled It Happens in One Day, where eight Mexican award-winning directors present works created in less than 24 hours. The shorts will be followed by tequila, Mexican beer, and bocaditos at an opening-night fiesta at Cuba Ocho Art and Research Center (1465 SW Eighth St., Miami). Tickets to the opening night party and shorts program cost $25.
This weekend, catch the mother-and-son drama Perpetuum Mobile Friday; To the Sea, where Mexican and Italian cultures clash, Saturday, and the border flick Northless Sunday.
Thu., May 13, 7:30 p.m., 2010