The Buenos Aires-based Society for Audiovisual Heritage has launched the dedicated label Latam Classics at the Lumiere Film Festival’s International Classic Film Market (MIFC) in Lyon.
The new Latin Classics label is dedicated to the promotion and international access of Latin American classic cinema.
In creating the Latin Classics label, the Society for Audiovisual Heritage collaborated with rights holders and institutions involved in the restoration of the works.
Making its debut at the MIFC, Latam Classics is presenting its inaugural catalogue, showcasing some of the most significant restored works of Latin American cinema, with films from Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru and Costa Rica, among them titles by Glauber Rocha (Brazil), Miguel Littín (Chile), Fernando “Pino” Solanas (Argentina) and Nora de Izcue (Peru).
The catalogue also includes Latin American restorations recently premiered at this year’s Cannes Classics, such as Ciro Durán’s 1962 Colombian-Venezuelan drama “La paga,” about a peasant in Colombia fighting to sustain his family amid severe exploitation; and Hugo del Carril’s 1956 Argentine drama “Más allá del olvido” (“Beyond Oblivion”) in which the director also stars alongside Laura Hidalgo as a grieving and obsessed widower who tries to turn another woman into his late wife.
The latter, restored by the Society for Audiovisual Heritage in collaboration with Cubic Restoration and Argentina Sono Film, the owner of the film, will also be screened at the Lumière Festival as part of its official selection under the Lumière Classics label.
“Latam Classics stands as a reference platform for the international circulation of restored films from the region, bringing together memory, culture, and technology to keep alive the history of Latin American cinema and strengthen its presence within the world’s film heritage,” Society for Audiovisual Heritage states.
Fernando Madedo (Latam Classics) with Anaïs Desrieux and Gérald Duchaussoy (MIFC)
Credit: Society for Audiovisual Heritage
Headed by Fernando Madedo, who also serves as director of the Ibero-American Federation of Film Producers (FIPCA), the Society for Audiovisual Heritage is a private organization dedicated to safeguarding moving images and overseeing the preservation, restoration and dissemination of Latin American audiovisual heritage.
To that end, the organization works in partnership with archives, film libraries, museums and studios to restore works and develop access strategies through programming in festivals, cinematheques and educational institutions around the world.
The Society’s other recent restoration projects include Mario Soffici’s 1958 Argentine noir drama “Rosaura a las 10” (“Rosaura at 10 O’Clock”), about a seemingly intense love affair at a small family-run boarding house, which has also screened at such major international events such as Cannes and the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City.
