Welcome to The Queue — your daily distraction of curated video content sourced from across the web. Today, we’re watching a video essay that offers a brief history of Nuevo Cine Mexicano.
There are a few simple pleasures that appeal directly to the heart of the unabashed cinephile: acquiring a brand spanking new piece of physical media; finessing a cozy new detail in a home theater setup, having a potentially risky film recommendation go over well; and, in what has become an especially pandemic-tinged activity, programming your own film series. After all, what is a weekend if not an opportunity to scratch the surface of historical and creative blindspots like tech-noirs, Neo-Westerns, or Thai horror?
One of the great boons of repertory cinemas is their keen curatorial eye. But when you can’t patronize your local arthouse (due to a virulent outbreak or simply because you simply don’t have a local arthouse to begin with), the next best thing is to do it yourself. With some guidance from film buffs in the know, of course.
The video essay below lays out everything you need to curate your very own intro film series to Nuevo Cine Mexicano (New Mexican Cinema). Referring to a rebirth of Mexican cinema’s Golden Age (1930-1960), the national renaissance of Mexican film began in the 1990s after decades of low-budget productions faded into obscurity as local audiences favored the Hollywood blockbuster.
Highlighting a concise trio of influential films from the influential group of filmmaker friends known as the “Three Amigos” — Guillermo del Toro‘s Cronos, Alejandro G. Iñárritu‘s Amores Perros, and Alfonso Cuarón‘s Y Tu Mamá También — the video offers a bite-sized introduction to the movement.
Watch “A Brief History of Nuevo Cine Mexicano“:
Who made this?
This video essay on Nuevo Cine Mexicano comes courtesy of the fine folks at Little White Lies, a film-obsessed magazine based in the United Kingdom. Will Webb wrote and edited the video, and Adam Woodward produced it. You can follow Little White Lies on Twitter here. And you can check out their official website here. You can subscribe to their YouTube account here.
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Related Topics: Alejandro Gonzales Inarritu, Alfonso Cuaron, Guillermo del Toro, Mexican Cinema, Mexico, The Queue
