La Flaca (The Bony Lady)
Synopsis:
La Flaca is a film about Arely Vazquez, a transgender woman and leader of the Santa Muerte (Saint Death) Cult in Queens, New York. During her yearly celebration to the Bony Lady ("La Flaca" as she likes to call her), Arely faces a lot of challenges to fulfill a promise she made ten years ago.
Directors: Thiago Zanato, Adriana Barbosa
Duration: 20:00
Country: Brazil, Mexico, USA
Festival Shorts Block
Saturday, September 21st, 1:00 PM - 9:00 PM
Location: UTD A&H Performance Hall in building JO
Director Bio:
ADRIANA BARBOSA: Adriana (1987), is a Mexican-Brazilian filmmaker based in São Paulo, Brazil. She is part of the Film Collective Cinefusão since 2009 where she took part of the script and art direction for the short films “Wax” (2009) and “String Quintet” (2010). In 2015 she produced the feature film “Young and Miserable” (Winner of Best Feature at Mostra de Cinema de Tiradentes 2016 and FICIC 2017) and in 2016 she produced the feature film “A film of Cinema”, both directed by Thiago B. Mendonça. In 2016, she also directs the short film “Ferroada” (Bite) selected at Off Cinema - Documentary Film Festival in Poland among others film festivals (Curta Cinema, Mostra de Cinema de Tiradentes, Off Cinema - International Documentary Film Festival in Poznan, Cheap Cuts Short Documentary Film Festival, Bucharest Short Films, Diametrale Experimental Film Festival, among many others). In 2018 she co-directs along with Thiago Zanato the short film “La Flaca”, about a transsexual Mexican woman and leader of the Santa Muerte (Saint Death) cult in Queens, NY. Also in 2018, She premieres her first documentary feature “Madrigal for a Living Poet” (2018) at the Official Competition of 21th Mostra de Cinema de Tiradentes and she continues her research on a documentary about the regional Mexican traditions about the death.
THIAGO ZANATO: Thiago Zanato (1979), is a Brazilian-American filmmaker splitting his time between Los Angeles/USA and São Paulo/Brazil. He started his career as an Art Director in advertising in Brazil and moved to the U.S. in 2005. He got involved in film as the creative director of projects such as "I'm Here", directed by Spike Jonze and "NY-Z", featuring Jay-Z and directed by Danny Clinch. In 2012, he started his own production company (Black Magic Films). He worked on films such as "Bite" (Brazil, 2016) and “Madrigal for a Living Poet” (Brazil, 2018) both directed by Adriana Barbosa and Bruno Mello Castanho. In 2018 he directed the short film “La Flaca” about a transsexual Mexican woman and leader of the Santa Muerte (Saint Death) cult in Queens, NY. The film was highly acclaimed and entered over 30 film festivals around the world, among them: the 32th Fribourg International Film Festival, 28th Message to Man, 29th New Orleans Film Festival, 40th Festival de la Havana, 22th Queer Lisboa, 21th Guanajuato International Film Festival, 28th Inside Out Toronto LGBT Film Festival, OutFest - LGBTQ Film Festival, 43th Frameline, and many others. He is currently directing his first feature documentary “Esu and the Universe” and continues his research about immigration and faith as resistance in Latino communities between the US and Mexico.