Colombia Selects Alejandro Landes’ “Monos” as Its Pick for the Oscar’s International Feature Film Race

Alejandro Landes is representing Colombia…

The 39-year-old Brazil-born Colombian-Ecuadorian film director’s latest project, the Spanish-language survival thriller Monos, has been selected as Colombia’s selection for the International Feature Film race at the 92nd Academy Awards.

Alejandro Landes

The film centers on a young group of soldiers and rebels training on a remote mountain in Latin America with an American hostage (Julianne Nicholson).

Moisés AriasSofia BuenaventuraDeiby RuedaKaren Quintero and Laura Castrillón star in the film, which Landes co-wrote with Alexis Dos Santos.

Monos

The film won a World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Awardat this year’s Sundance Film Festivalin Park City, Utah. 

The news comes as Neon and co-distributor Participant Media prepare to release the film theatrically in the U.S. on September 13.

Colombia has only seen one film nominated in what was formerly known as the Best Foreign Language Film category. That was Ciro Guerra’s Embrace of the Serpent in 2015, the year Hungary’s Son of Saulwon the Oscar.

Cabral Signs with the Agency for the Performing Arts (APA)

José María Cabral has new representation…

The 28-year-old Dominican filmmaker,who just debuted his film Carpinteros at the Sundance Film Festival, has signed with APA (Agency for the Performing Arts) for agency representation.

José María Cabral

Carpinteros, which Cabral wrote and directed, was one of the 12 films chosen to premiere in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition.

Shot in an actual jail with real inmates and prison guards, the film follows Julián (Jean Jean), who finds love and a reason for living in the last place imaginable: the Dominican Republic’s Najayo Prison. His romance with fellow prisoner Yanelly (Judith Rodriguez Perez) must develop through sign language and without the knowledge of dozens of guards.

Cabral’s 2012 drama Jaque Mate! was selected that year as the Dominican Republic’s Oscar entry for the foreign language film.