Latido Films nabs Conquistador era semi-Western “The Weight”

PanARMENIAN.Net - Driving into Mexico, one of Latin America’s most vital film scenes, Latido Films has picked up world sales rights to Conquistador era semi-Western “La Carga” (The Weight,) the second feature from Mexico-based director-producer Alan Jonsson (“La Morenita, el escandalo”), Variety reports.

A Mexico-Spain co-production with an international cast, “La Carga” is set up at Jonsson’s La Esfera Ent. in Mexico City and Luis Angel Ramirez’s Astronauta Producciones in Madrid.

Deal was closed at the 9th Madrid de Cine-Spanish Film Screenings, a national film sales market, which ran Nov. 16-18. Latido will be talking up the title at Latin American mega-mart Ventana Sur.

Described as a “dazzling semi-Western,” and set in the sixteenth century, historical adventure movie “The Weight” turns on a manhunt, of Elisa (Maria Valverde), a young Spanish noblewoman, and Painalli, Aztec chief (Horacio Garcia Rojas) by a brutal group of soldiers commandeered by a vengeful landowner (Eusebio Lazaro). Elisa’s life will depend on the young Aztec’s resilience and his outsmarting his hunters, in a quest that can influence the destiny of millions of Native Americans in Latin America.

Valverde played Zipporah, Moses’ wife, in “Exodus: Gods and Kings,” actor-producer Garcia Rojas was featured in “Texas Rising” and co-starred in “Julia,” with Tilda Swinton. Lazaro played with Lena Headey and Penelope Cruz in “The Man With Rain in his Shoes.” His credits also include Guillermo del Toro’s “Pan’s Labyrinth” and Milos Forman’s “Goya’s Ghosts.”

Jonsson’s 2008 debut, “La Morenita, el escandalo” won him best director at Spain’s Huelva Latin American Festival.

“The Weight” “is the film that the Latin-American industry had to do about the Conquest, an adventure film set up against real historic events, told to entertain and capture the imagination of all sort of audiences: a crowd pleaser by a very gifted director delivering tension, good action, powerful images and impressive acting, against the backdraft of great set designing,” said Antonio Saura, Latido general manager.

“We are very pleased that Latido has come so quickly to join us after we screened the film in Madrid de cine. We were conquered by their commitment and enthusiasm for the film,” Ramirez added.

Focused primarily – but not entirely – on Spanish-language world cinema, the Madrid-based sales house acquired Celso Garcia’s Guillermo del Toro produced “The Thin Yellow Line,” which topped March’s Guadalajara Fest, then homed in on to acquire Locarno competition player “I Promise You Anarchy,” from Julio Hernandez Colon, an IFF Panama Primera Mirada winner at rough-cut showcase and reckoned by many to be his best film to date.

Positioning itself yet more as a main vendor of Latino cinemas in general and Mexican and Spanish cinema in particular, Latido also picked-up Arturo Ripstein’s real-life crime drama “Bleak Street,” which played out of competition at the 72nd Venice Festival this September, as Ripstein received a Biennale Award to celebrate a 50-year-old career.