The film “Malpaso”, directed by Héctor M. Valdez, won the Special Jury Prize at the Ibero-Latin American Film Festival of Trieste, Italy.
The 80-minute fiction feature film was screened in the cinemas of the Italian city from last Friday the 12th to Sunday the 14th within the framework of the cinematographic day that was held from last November 6 to last Monday the 15th.
Likewise, film lovers were able to see “Malpaso” on the festival’s web platforms from last Saturday the 13th to Monday the 15th.
Héctor M. Valdez (Santo Domingo, 1989) is a graduate of McGill University in Montreal, QC. He began shooting shorts as a teenager and made his feature film debut in 2013. In 2017 he premiered “Peaches” at the Montreal World Film Festival and won the ‘Film of the Festival’ award at the Raindance Film Festival that same year. .
Then he premiered his third feature film, “Malpaso”, at the end of 2019 at the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, for which he won important awards such as the “Silver Biznaga for Best Music” at the Malaga Film Festival and Best International Film at the New York Film Festival.
“Malpaso” is another step in the filmography of the young director of stories of such different themes as “South of innocence”, “Republic of Color” or “Peaches”.
A variety that expresses that the search for an audiovisual identity continues, and that in “Malpaso” it offers a drama of ethnic and social intentions.
Its protagonists include Luis Bryan Mesa, Ariel Díaz, Peter Jean Baptiste, Marie Michele Bazile and Vicente Santos.
Apart from the young actors Mesa and Díaz, the professionals Pepe Sierra and Ramón Candelario also participate, as well as Wigberto Deschamps, Peter Jean Baptiste and others.
When he presented the film, Valdez recalled the impression that his first encounter with the Dominican-Haitian border, when he was a teenager and, above all, the binational market between Haiti and the Dominican Republic gave him.
“I’ve always had a need to tell a story about the border,” he commented in 2019, and that this film was the result.
+ From the movie
“Malpaso” tells the story of Cándido and Braulio who are raised by their grandfather on the outskirts of the Jimaní border market. Day by day, Braulio helps his grandfather sell charcoal in the market, while Cándido remains confined doing housework, due to his albinism. Their lives take an unexpected turn after the death of their grandfather.
Braulio will have to take care of his brother and both will try to survive from day to day. In turn, Cándido does not stop dreaming of the eventual return of his father, who abandoned them at birth.
The script is by Héctor Valdez with José Ramón Alamá, David Maler, José Pastor and Angel de la Cruz.
The photograph is by Juan Carlos Gómez; edition, Rocío Gattinoni; soundtrack, Pascal Gaigne; Sound, La Nave Post Office Laboratory.
The filming was done in the binational market in the town of Malpaso, Jimaní and made entirely in black and white.
The film “Malpaso” was chosen in 2020 to represent the Dominican Republic in the Goya awards in its 2020 edition.
In addition to the film’s triumphs in important international film events, there is also the Best Film award at the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival, held in that country.
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