FILM: BOSTON PREMIERE

EL VELADOR (The Night Watchman)

By Natalia Almada  

"EL VELADOR is an unsettlingly quiet, even lyrical film about a world made and unmade by violence."—AO Scott, The New York Times

"Mesmerizing!"—Time Out

Award-winning director Natalia Almada returns to the ICA with El Velador (Mexico, 2011, 72 min), a beautiful and mesmerizing new film. The story follows Martin, the night watchman who guards over the extravagant mausoleums of Mexico’s notorious drug lords. This city of the dead sits at the intersection between ordinary life and the violent conflict of Mexico’s drug wars, which have already claimed over 60,000 lives. Staged within the labyrinth of a cemetery, this film highlights the tumult and violence of an era while reminding us that ordinary life persists and quietly defies the dead—all within the turmoil of Mexico’s bloodiest conflict since the Revolution.

Natalia Almada’s directing credits include Al Otro Lado (2006), her award-winning debut feature documentary about immigration, drug trafficking and corrido music; and El General (2009), a film about her own great-grandfather, Mexican president Plutarco Elias Calles, one of Mexico's most controversial revolutionary figures. The ICA presented the Boston premieres of both Al Otro Lado and El General.