Discoveries from Colombia World Cinema

Alirio, an old farmer, travels to the city in search of a carpenter who can build him a giant, majestic coffin.

Cecilia, a selfless 52-year-old woman, decides to break with her life of sacrifices after years of enduring her son s irresponsibility and her family s ingratitude, finally seeking her independence.

In a rural post-modern world, grieving parents are offered a chance to speak with their dead daughter through a cutting-edge device—but soon the lines between faith and technology begin to blur.

A curse has separated Santiago and Alejandra. The moon, moved by their love, grants them a chance to meet again. On the threshold between memory and oblivion, remembering becomes an act of faith as they strive to hold on to what still binds them.

Abel has just buried his father. In search of the roots he never had and trying to understand the reasons behind his father’s suicide, he travels to the village of his paternal relatives. There, he will confront the haunting stories and open wounds of the family he never knew.

S. writes to Juan, who is deeply asleep. She reflects on images and cinema, and a piece of advice from a director she admires challenges her and all her previous work. Determined to find an idea behind the images she has recorded so far, S. wanders among materials, her own archive of images and sounds, internet browser tabs, western films and Japanese short stories. S. compiles all these thoughts and findings into a letter, hoping to deliver it to Juan when he wakes up.

In a town where it never stops raining, a boy who can't walk dreams of walking again. With the help of a woman who is also seeking healing, he will discover that, even in the midst of a storm, the most powerful force is born from love and hope.

A chart refers to a document that records the visible and invisible characteristics of places and people; cartography or missive. Through the first letter sent by a filmmaker to his beloved, this film embarks on a journey guided by dreams and chance among real, imaginary and extinct charts, exploring their inescapable and elusive relationship with love.

Between dream and reality, two close friends try to deal with sadness and a sense of emptiness by reliving the same idyllic afternoon over and over again... or perhaps the same dream.

In Los Moreneros, an Afro village in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, in the Colombian Guajira; there is a community that treasures ancient knowledge of black cuisine. Midwives and old people know the secret of Chicharro, a corozo-based stew that is only prepared there. To prevent this flavor from being buried by time, a school arises in the backyards of the houses where the old men teach the children black recipes in wood stoves. Yasser, a 10-year-old kitchen apprentice, shows us how his grandmother Yiya, the great master of Chicharro, transmits wisdom and flavor to future cooks in the region.

Bella, a survivor of the Bojayá massacre, is left deaf and now faces the demons of a society in crisis in present-day Quidbó. She must return to the land where she was born to heal her traumas and reconnect with the strength of her ancestors.

Documentary about the life and work of Faustina Orobio, known as "Mi Santa Comadre" (My Holy Godmother), a singer of traditional music from the southern Pacific coast of Colombia. Through her vast knowledge of the music and oral traditions of this region, she has become the guardian of marimba music and traditional songs, declared by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

A group of Afro-Ecuadorian women, leaders from the Yurumanguí River, gather to perform a Theater-Memory exercise. The play they create tells the story of Rómula, a woman who fought against slavery during colonization. However, now more than ever, it also speaks to the present and their current struggles surrounding the armed conflict in their territory.

Duván, a 39-year-old unemployed Colombian, struggles between his work life and the intimacy of his home, searching for a glimmer of hope that will lift him out of his confusion.

A film about the sowing and harvesting of wheat in Colombia’s Cundiboyacense high plateau. Through biblical intertitles and pastoral scenes, a bucolic poem unfolds—evoking the rhythms of the land, the dignity of agricultural labor, and the soul of rural life.

Filmed at Hacienda Toledito and starring the talented children of Labateca.

A story set in Calamar, a village in the middle of the Colombian jungle, where Blanca, a midwife by vocation, continues to bring life into this world. Her hands, the legacy of decades of service to the community, make her a guardian of life in a territory where violence, glyphosate, and neglect have left an indelible mark on the deep memory of its inhabitants. Together with Margarita, her friend and accomplice, we explore the profound relationship that destiny has bestowed upon them in relation to a birth.

The helplessness and loneliness of the Bogota night meet Andrea on her way home. Tired after a very long day, she boards the bus that will take her home with the sole desire of arriving safe and sound on a fleeting journey, considering that she is the only passenger. When a strange passenger boards the bus, anxiety and paranoia turn Andrea into his slave.

Dina Moscovici films a portrait of Bogotá.

A Venezuelan taxi driver in Bogotá faces an impossible choice when a wealthy passenger offers him money to cover his sick daughter's medical bills — but the price is becoming complicit in a deadly crime.

And the son said to his father: «Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son».

“Ese” is a journalist and has to travel due to work. Meanwhile, “Ele” (her partner) stays at home with his plants and his work as a biologist as company. In her absence, they correspond with postcards and, between Ese’s enthusiasm for her travels and Ele’s nostalgia, their correspondence comes to embody their love, which is inevitably transformed by time and distance.

The documentary provokes reflection on artisanal fishing and the importance of preserving the history of fishermen in the department of Sucre.

In this documentary we will take a journey through the cultural expressions of the Colombian Caribbean, focusing on orality and body language as forms of communication deeply rooted in the identity and resistance of the Caribbean region.

Is it possible that folk music has the power to bring back a lost mother? Andrés, in a journey between sound and memory, the gaita becomes his only language with the past and the memories of a caress he never forgot.

A group of women face the drought of their land through a crop that is the solution to the food and economic crisis: the nopal, as water scarcity has developed a peasant crisis in Santander.

A rescue with a spinning tops, feathers, eggs and friends.

At the end of the carnival, Felipe, a young man from Barranquilla, feels lost and depressed. His friends, Daniela and Sofia, are looking for a way to cheer him up, that's how they discover an agency that proposes an unforgettable adventure, taking them to different corners of “La Arenosa” and their friendship that they didn't know before.

Some grandmother's stories are never forgotten. Sofi's older sister's skin crawls when something on the radio reminds her of an old story: the well. The problem is that she has just sent little Sofia out to fetch firewood... right by that spot.

During an art exhibition dedicated to the culture of the Colombian Pacific, Male and Yuli, two young art students, are attracted by a mysterious painting that seems to come to life.

Two peasant children fully enjoy their territory, a political circumstance can change their friendship, everything depends on a couple of words that will be pronounced by one of their parents.

The ancient warrior Ako is sent by the ancient gods to the present day to save the world from the evil general Atar, who has plunged it into his malevolent and warlike universe. Finding the brave Juanita, they embark on a crusade to bring Atar's victims to safety, but they understand that this is only the beginning of their mission.

Short Film

In a large village nestled among the mountains, far from the sea, one day a man appeared on the shore carrying a canoe. "Where do you go to the sea?" he asked. "But when I was born, I knew the sea." Between jokes, he's challenged to follow the course of the waters.

¿Por qué nadie me lo dijo? immerses the viewer in the internal struggle of Jordi, a Spanish film director, who tries to overcome the aftermath of a toxic relationship. Media harassment, doubts about his talent and the fear of returning to to love are intertwined in a plot that explores the limits of manipulation and psychological violence. A film that lays bare the shadows of being a man and the importance of mental health.

Bendición de Dios, a challenging settlement where adversity coexists with the constant construction of hope. The community has transcended the physical, turning this place into a symbol. The video letter, the central axis, exposes the unique realities, highlighting the children who, despite the difficulties, find in the game an escape.

This documentary presents the life and work of Kekar, a 68-year-old Colombian cartoonist who, after an unexpected retirement, returns to his passion by re-encountering Colombian issues.

The children tackle topics that are familiar to them, such as the environment and nature, but they also incorporate elements of myths, legends and their own fantasies.

Felipe and Mayerly, 9 years old, do not know each other and live a very different but they have something in common, the breakup of their family nucleus. They are learning to live their new complex life. The obstacles in their paths will lead them to meet on December 7, the day of the candles.

The bubble is perfect until it breaks. Daniela Riascos places this story of a teenager, her family, and her small group of friends from a position that reveals the presumptions of those who seem to have everything.

In the middle of the banana-growing area of Urabá, Mairen, an Afro woman, eight months pregnant, goes into labor in an unpopulated area. Although her health is in danger, Mairen, resigned, lies down in a tree to await her fate.

Animated sequences that recreate the origins of three fundamental foods for the Colombian diet: sugar cane, rice and corn.

To raise our head and look at something else, not to think about what the book said but something that reminded us of it. Sting are the interstices of reading. Of the book made notebook, of the reading that becomes a new image. New images. A volcano and a bull, and the traces of the loaded brush. Pieces of a visit to the dentist and the tiredness of a body that seems to suffer from pain.

Each year, 26-year-old María Yessenia Herrera, best-known as “Chena”, joins the traveling diaspora of peasants who move around Colombia working as hand-picking coffee harvesters. Traveling and working constitute the basis of her autonomy. She keeps a notebook in her luggage where she writes and reflects about her past and the life that she faces as a woman and as a mother who must provide for a household full of problems and scarcity from afar. Despite her youth, her body is weakening, calling into question her own idea of freedom.

Javier receives emails about her sister who disappeared five years ago. He'll have to solve the three riddles contained in the mails having 24 hours to do it.