SAN FRANCISCO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL TO PRESENT AN EVENING WITH ACCLAIMED CUBAN EDITOR, NELSON RODRIGUEZ


Festival will Screen Over 30 Films From Latin America

The 46th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 17 - May 1) will be hosting an onstage interview and clip show with influential Cuban film editor, Nelson Rodríguez and screening his deftly edited music film, WE ARE THE MUSIC (1964).
A vital part of Cuban cinema since the 1960s, Rodríguez's masterful editing has been a major factor in bringing Latin America's most acclaimed directors including Tomás Gutiérrez Alea, Patricio Guzmán, Maria Novaro and Humberto Solás to international prominence. Linda Blackaby, associate director of programming, says "It's a wonderful opportunity to consider the history and development of Latin American cinema from the point of view of one of its pioneers."

Mentored by Mario González, who was a prize-winning editor during the golden age of Mexican cinema, Rodríguez earned respect by piecing together sequences for the Cuban Film Institute's montage-based Weekly Latin American Newsreel. While working for the Institute, he relished the opportunity to edit his first feature documentary about Cuba's literacy campaign combined with a summary of the key events of 1961, the third year of the new revolutionary government. In 1968, Rodríguez edited two of the most honored films of Cuban cinema, MEMORIES OF UNDERDEVELOPMENT and the epic, LUCIA (SFIFF 1973). Today, Rodríguez continues to work as one of Latin America's most renowned film editors, having most recently completed ROBLE de OLOR (2002) with director Rigoberto López.

The onstage interview, facilitated by UC Santa Cruz professor, Julianne Burton-Carvajal, will be held at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres on Tuesday, April 29 at 8:30 pm. On Monday, April 28 at 9:45 pm at the Kabuki and Wednesday, April 30 at 9:00 pm at the Pacific Film Archive the Festival will screen director Rogelio Paris' WE ARE THE MUSIC which includes glorious footage of some of Cuba's greatest musicians in the mid-1960s.

In addition to the Nelson Rodríguez tribute, the Festival will be showing a strong Latin American selection that includes over 30 films from nine countries. The films include DURVAL DISCOS (Anna Muylaert, Brazil), which is set in a record (no CDs) store and has a wonderful soundtrack of Brazilian popular music of the 1970s; BUS 174 (José Padilha, Brazil) a documentary about a bus hijacking in Rio de Janeiro in 2000; GABRIEL OROZCO (Juan Carlos Martín, Mexico) a documentary about an outstanding contemporary artist; ADVENTURES OF GOD (Eliseo Subiela, Argentina), a virtual stream-of-consciousness dreamscape and metaphysical thriller; Subiela's DARK SIDE OF THE HEART 2, the sequel to his 1993 film about a poet and his search for the fantasy woman who can "fly"; EL LEYTON (Gonzalo Justiniano, Chile) a love triangle that turns a quiet village upside down; MADAME SATÂ (Karim Ainouz, Brazil), a biopic of transvestite Jo Francisco de Santos who struggled to find freedom as a black gay outlaw in the 1930s; MANGO YELLOW (Claudio Assis, Brazil), a story of romantic encounters and misadventures involving a waiter, a gay chef, a butcher and his Evangelical wife; VIRGIN OF LUST (Arturo Ripstein, Mexico), which focuses on a sadomasochistic relationship between a lonely waiter and a self-destructive prostitute and COMANDANTE (Oliver Stone, USA), a documentary by the Academy Award-winning director filmed as he follows Fidel Castro through Havana and they discuss on politics, revolution, movies and sex.

The 46th San Francisco International Film Festival runs April 17-May 1, 2003 at the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres "The Home of the Festival", the Castro Theatre, the Pacific Film Archive Theater in Berkeley and the CinéArts at Palo Alto Square in Palo Alto. Advance ticket packages and Festival passes go on sale beginning February 17. Individual tickets for San Francisco Film Society members will be available beginning March 25, with individual tickets for the general public available starting March 31. To purchase tickets and for ticket information log on to www.sffs.org or call 925-275-9490. The Main Box Office, located in the atrium of the AMC Kabuki 8 Theatres at 1881 Post Street will open for Film Society members on March 25 and for the general public on April 1. There will also be a Satellite Box Office at Crocker Galleria, 50 Post Street, second floor, opening on March 26. For up-to-date Festival information log on to www.sffs.org or call 415-931-FILM.

The 46th San Francisco International Film Festival (April 17-May 1, 2003) is presented by the San Francisco Film Society, a nonprofit organization whose goal is to lead in expanding the knowledge and appreciation of international film art and its artists by showcasing the most compelling, thought-provoking international films, special tributes, major restorations and today's brightest stars.