April Activities: Chicago Latino Film Fest, Hand Me the Mike, and more!
Also I'm a finalist for an award and also I'm raising money for abortions. Yay!
Good afternoon dearest friends. I hope you've been surviving the abject misery of trying to live in a society these days and have found pockets of joy, community, and hope as the days go on.
I wanted to provide a few updates, particularly as I plan to ramp up my writing frequency on this blog. It seems like it might be an abundant spring!
First off, starting this Thursday I will be covering the Chicago Latino Film Festival. This is my first year attending as press, and I am ecstatic to have the chance to give the fest the full-coverage treatment! I plan to see at least 15 films from this year's excellent line-up, representing nearly as many countries, including: Bolivia, Chile, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela.
🇧🇴 🇨🇱 🇩🇴 🇪🇨 🇭🇳 🇲🇽 🇵🇦 🇵🇾 🇵🇪 🇵🇷 🇪🇸 🇺🇾 🇻🇪
I'll be writing capsule reviews for this blog almost daily and will send regular dispatches every few days to email subscribers (including a round-up of my most recent reviews). If you've followed me long enough, you know I'm an advocate for preserving and championing Latin American cinema, and I'm really excited to share with you the latest films coming out of Latin America (and Spain, I guess... kidding). While I'm at the fest, I also look forward to reading John King's Magical Reels, a 1980 book that recounts the history of Latin American film on a country-by-country basis (I'm reading the 2000 edition, which was updated to include an additional chapter about the 90s). I know a bit about Mexican film history, but very little about most other countries in the region. I'm excited to dive in further!
In case you missed it, last week I published the first of a two-part, researched piece on the relationship between federal arts agencies—like the NEA and NEH—and the U.S. film industry. I've been working on this piece for at least eight months and have probably screwed up my eyes parsing through dozens of scanned NEA annual reports, but I think the results are worth it, especially as we consider the current state of independent filmmaking and how to build an ecosystem that can actually survive the future.
Read the first part here:
Daniella Mazzio
I plan to release the second part this month, so stay tuned!
PLUS: After a bit of a hiatus, Hand Me the Mike is back! I can't promise the podcast will always be on a consistent schedule, but I can promise that there are more episodes coming. Our latest ep is on John Waters' Cecil B. Demented, featuring writer and journalist Natalie Marlin. Cecil B. Demented is a favorite of mine, and this conversation is (in my opinion) one of the best we've had on the pod.
Here's a little taste of the episodes you can expect in the near future....
➡️ Nuremberg (2025) featuring film critic Zachary Lee
➡️ Midnight Special (2016) featuring film critic Alejandra Martinez
➡️ Chain Reaction (1996) featuring comedian Tristan Smith
➡️ Night's End (2022) featuring musician and writer Soraya Sebghati
➡️ Vanilla Sky (2001) featuring Hit Factory pod's Aaron Casias
... and more!
Some final end notes...
🎉 My piece for the Chicago Reader on NEA/NEH funding cuts in Chicago is a finalist for a Peter Lisagor Award for Best Arts and Entertainment Reporting (small/medium outlet). I am very honored by this recognition and extremely proud of this piece (though devastated by its persistent relevance). Award winners will be announced May 8th.
📖 I just finished reading Vicky Osterweil's The Extended Universe: How Disney Killed the Movies and Took Over the World. If you haven't figured it out based on my reporting on public funding, my interest in Latin American history as it relates to its film industries, and how every Hand Me the Mike episode ends with "What does this movie say about America?" I believe cinema is inherently political, and I am also extremely interested in investigating those intersections. What I love about Osterweil's book is how the intersection between public policy x filmmaking is researched and observed. I highly recommend checking her book out.
🇵🇸 In between Chicago Latino Film Fest screenings, I also hope to see a decent amount of films shown at this year's Chicago Palestine Film Festival. Look out for dispatches from those screenings sprinkled throughout the next few weeks.
💝 I have joined a kickass team for this year's Chicago Abortion Fund Abort-a-thon. If you have the means, please consider donating to our team. If you are in Chicago, you can also join us on Thursday, May 7th for a Karaoke Fundraiser at Pilsen Community Books!
Scan the QR code for my donation page, or check out the direct link here: https://fund.nnaf.org/fundraiser/7089070
Until next time...
xoxo
Daniella