The Mexican state of Oaxaca, deep in the south of the country, is the home of the Mixtec, one of the indigenous Indian peoples. It’s where Soledad, a traditional healer, lives with her 7-year-old grandson José. His mother Adela, Soledad’s daughter, left many years ago to work in Mexico City. One day Adela calls: she is getting married and now wants José to come and live with her in the city.
What happens to a culture’s identity and continuity when the younger generation is forced to leave for other places because they offer better prospects? In an increasingly globalized world, questions like these are more relevant than ever. This is the question director and writer Itandehui Jansen, daughter of a Mexican mother and a Dutch father, poses in her feature debut. The result is a poetic ode to life in small, rural communities.
After the film screening there will be a Q&A session with the director.
About the director:
As a filmmaker and researcher, Dr. Itandehui Jansen is interested in the interrelation between fiction and documentary and in the synergy between film theory and practice. She studied an MFA in Directing Film at the Film Academy in Amsterdam and finished her PhD at the Academy of Creative and Performing Arts at Leiden University in the Netherlands. Her PhD research focused on both practice and theory of Accented Cinema. At present she is interested in how cinema represents the art of filmmaking and how this is connected to aspects of self-reflexivity in film.
Itandehui Jansen will also be participating in the Roundtable Diversity and Inclusion on 18th August at 19:00 o’clock in De Balie.