Pragda Film Essential Collection

Indiana University Bloomington faculty, staff and students now have access to 100 hand-picked essential and must-have films that authentically capture the soul and spirit of Spain, Latin America, and Latinx communities. The Pragda Film Essential Collection features award-winning classics and contemporary works that showcase the extraordinary storytelling traditions of the region, while exploring the most pressing themes of our time.

Faculty and researchers in the departments of Art, Caribbean, Gender and Media studies, Spanish and Portuguese, Psychology, and Sociology will enjoy these awe-inspiring titles such as 100 Ways to Cross the Border = 100 maneras de cruzar la frontera, A History of an Assignment = Istoria odnoi komandirovki, Alegría, Bixa Travesty, Chircales = Brickmakers, Pelo Malo = Bad Hair and more! Access to this wonderful collection can also be explored through the library’s A-Z database.

100 Ways to Cross the Border = 100 maneras de cruzar la frontera (2022, 84min.) Directed by Amber Bemak, produced by Amber Bemak, Andrew Houchens. At a time when there is more and more news in the mainstream media about the U.S.-Mexico border, 100 Ways to Cross the Border (2022) presents the work and philosophical frameworks of an artist who has had a sustained dedication to radical, highly impactful, and innovative artistic interventions on the border. This vibrant documentary explores the 40-year career of prolific Latinx performance artist Guillermo Gómez-Peña as he enacts his interventions by “queering the border” — claiming all borders as queer and liminal spaces.

A History of an Assignment = Istoria odnoi komandirovki (2021, 52min.) Directed by Vladimir Nepevny, produced by Arsen Gottlieb. Thanks to recently declassified documents, A History of an Assignment uncovers an unknown episode of the Cuban Missile Crisis. The threat of nuclear conflict was not eliminated by the Khrushchev-Kennedy negotiations. Indeed, Fidel Castro, who was not invited to take part in the talks, learned about them from the press and was greatly hurt to see Cuba become a bargaining chip between the USSR and the USA and his own role reduced to that of an extra. Castro vigorously stepped in and made his move. In a secret message to Khrushchev, Castro declared that he would not allow the removal of Soviet missiles, much less an American inspection, a necessary prerequisite of the Soviet-American agreement; that Cuba, left alone with its enemy, would defend itself and would launch a preventive nuclear strike if necessary.

Alegría (2021, 104min.) Directed by Violeta Salama, produced by Clara Nieto. Alegría’s life shifts profoundly upon discovering that her orthodox Jewish brother insists on holding his daughter’s wedding in Melilla, an autonomous, multicultural Spanish city on Africa’s north coast, where Jews, Muslims, and Christians mix and mingle and come together to make the wedding happen. It is a gorgeous evocation of a fascinating and beautiful corner of the world not often seen on-screen. Guided by Dunia, her Arab housekeeper, and Marian, her Christian confidante, Alegría embarks on a journey to connect with her roots while assisting her niece, Yael, in navigating womanhood within a highly conservative male-dominated environment. Renowned Mexican actress Cecilia Suárez (The House of Flowers, 3 Caminos) takes the lead, infusing the film with her charisma and impeccable comedic timing, amidst a backdrop of familial tumult and conflicting traditions.

Bixa Travesty (2018, 75min.) Directed by Claudia Priscilla and Kiko Goifman. The female trans*body becomes a political means of expression in both public and private space. This documentary is about the life of the Brazilian transsexual singer Linn da Quebrada. Coming from an impoverished region of São Paulo, where she has to face many prejudices, among others, for being black. Her funk music sounds like a “gun” against machismo. With a really strong and daring stage presence, she constantly seeks to confront and fight paradigms and stereotypes.

Chircales = Brickmakers (1972, 43min.) Directed and produced by Martha Rodriguez and Jorge Silva. An essential and highly influential classic for years to come, restored by the Arsenal Institut fur film und videokunst (Berlin). One of the first documentary works by Marta Rodríguez and Jorge Silva, Chircales is the product of two of the most prominent and rebellious voices of the New Latin American Cinema. Rabidly current, Chircales is an exercise for a film production methodology that could be adapted to the sociopolitical conditions of Latin America. Using the framework of “participant observation,” Marta Rodríguez and Jorge Silva integrated themselves into the community of brickmakers with the Castañeda family to offer a more honest and complex portrait of feminist activism and Indigenous resistance. Depicting the shocking poverty, domestic abuse, and exploitation of indigenous women and children in Tunjuelito, a neighborhood in southern Bogotá, Chircales chronicles the life of the Castañeda family for five years. The documentary shows the regime of exploitation to which it is subjected by the landowners of large farms from whom they were renting land for artisanal brick production. In capturing these experiences, Rodríguez and Silva also created a methodology for documentary cinema in conditions of political violence that has been studied and replicated by filmmakers since then.

Pelo Malo = Bad Hair (2013, 93min.) Directed by Mariana Rondón, produced by Marité Ugás. A nine-year-old boy’s preening obsession with straightening his hair elicits a tidal wave of homophobic panic in his hard-working mother, in this tender but clear-eyed coming-of-age tale. Junior is a beautiful boy, with big brown eyes, a delicate frame, and a head of luxurious dark curls. But Junior aches to straighten those curls, to acquire a whole new look befitting his emerging fantasy image of himself as a long-haired singer. As the opportunity approaches to have his photo taken for the new school year, that ache turns into a fiery longing. Junior’s mother, Marta (Samantha Castillo), is barely hanging on. The father of her children has died, she recently lost her job as a security guard, and she now struggles to put a few arepas on the table for Junior and his baby brother.

Monique Threatt, Head, of Media Services, serving the IUB community since the parting of the Red Sea.