The 73rd edition of the Berlin International Film Festival announced its winners, including three Mexican productions. the echo, by the Salvadoran director Tatiana Huezo; in addition to Totem and adolfo of the native directors of Mexico Lila Aviles and Sofia Auza, respectively, have triumphed this Saturday at the closing of the Berlinale.
The award for Best Documentary went to the co-production between Mexico and Germany, in which the director portrays El eco, a remote town located in the north of Mexico, where life is made up of the most elemental things. Being a child in that town is an intense experience from day one, involving nature, animals and people, but also love, intimacy, illness and death, according to the synopsis.
According to the jury, “this deeply affectionate film shows the passing of time, a world opening up” and called it “a fascinating new piece in the director’s already distinguished body of work.” Likewise, the director, who lives in Mexico, won the award for Best Direction in the Encounters section of the Berlinale. “For the sweet confidence and uncompromising honesty in the direction, which magnifies both the powerful human quality of its protagonists and their connection with nature”reads the statement from the Encounters section.
“It really uplifts my soul and my spirit to be able to portray real female characters”, while in the cinema and in the media “we are used to seeing very static female characters, full of cliches, who comply with a norm or who are objects of the desire,” says Huezo.
In the press conference after the awards gala, Huezo spoke of “a night to celebrate the documentary”, a genre of which he said that “it is a path of love and faith.” The filmmaker dedicated the award to the inspiration of her life -her daughter- of hers and to all the women who make films in Mexico and to all the women directors who paved the way.
Huezo is one of the current voices of the most important Latin American documentary. His previous works as the smallest placea testimony of the experience of the civil war in El Salvador, as well as Stormwhich addresses the issue of organized crime and justice in Mexico through the story of two women, have won various prestigious international awards.
Another director who was recognized in Berlin is Lila Aviles. In Totem, co-produced by Mexico, Denmark and France, tells the story of Sol, a seven-year-old girl who spends the day at her grandfather’s house helping with the preparations for a surprise party for her father. Little by little everything begins to become more chaotic, fracturing the family foundations. In her second feature film after the chambermaid, Platinum Award-winning film for Best Film, the jury highlighted “the complex and sensitive way that it illustrates the love that keeps a family touched by a terminal illness together, while showing how they deal with death in Mexico.”
Other Mexican production adolfo, by Sofia Auza, won the Crystal Bear in the Generation 14Plus section of the Berlinale, dedicated to young audiences. The story of the boy who loses his father and must find a new home for a cactus named Adolfo captivated the Generation Awards jury “for his sense of humor” and “philosophical poetic” dialogue, the organization argued in a statement. of the awards.
With the recognitions obtained in the 2023 edition, Mexican cinema continues its harvest of awards at the Berlinaleconsidered one of the big three festivals along with those of Venice and Cannes. Previously, in 2022, the film gem cloakby the director born in Bolivia and with Mexican nationality Natalia Lopez Gallardo, got the Silver Bear, one of the most important prizes of the film competition, with a story that deals with the issue of disappearances and drug violence from the experience of three women.
