Costa Rica’s inaugural Media Market and its Film Festival, now in its 13th edition, marked a number of firsts this year. The Costa Rica Media Market (CRMM) not only met its targets but surpassed them while the film festival celebrated its first female director with filmmaker Patricia Velásquez at the helm, who fostered more parity in its programming. CRMM also launched the Costa Rica Fantastic Lab in partnership with Grupo Morbido, led by Pablo Guisa, and hosted the third edition of the Tres Puertos Costa Rica development lab. All in all, both main events were a success, as a flurry of networking activities, including six fam trips, spurred new alliances.
Festival-wise, Juan Manuel Fernández’s “El Monaguillo, el cura y el jardinero” won Best Costa Rican Feature film, while Best Costa Rican Short Film went to Kim Torres’s “Soñé con un paisaje.” Ana Endara’s festival hit “Querido Trópico” won Best Central American and Caribbean Feature Film, while Best Central American and Caribbean Short Film was awarded to Pamela Bencosme’s “Depeyize.” The audience award resulted in a tie between Yoel Morales’s “La Bachata de Biónico” and Félix “Trillo” Guardia’s “El Brujo.”
Below are some key points:
Focus on Women
This year marked the first edition of the festival with a woman at the helm, filmmaker Patricia Velásquez. The festival also achieved gender parity within its program and scrapped its filmmaker-focused retrospective in favor of a showcase of contemporary Spanish female directors in collaboration with the Madrid Women’s Film Festival and Red RAMPA.
A Festival for All Audiences
Velásquez emphasized that one of her main goals as the new head of the festival is to expand its audience, leaving the realm of cinephiles where the festival stood for many years to aggregate more families, as well as younger and older audiences. With that in mind, the festival featured favorites of the circuit including Payal Kapadia’s “All We Imagine as Light,” Andrea Arnold’s “Bird” and Georgi M. Unkovski’s “DJ Ahmet,” as well as dedicating an entire strand to Generation Alpha and films that reflect the life of younger generations in Costa Rica and the world.
Pura Vida
Come to Costa Rica and you will see the words “Pura Vida” everywhere, from the plentiful merchandise lining up tourist shops to casual greetings on the street. The phrase, which translates literally to “pure life,” is the country’s national philosophy and it stands for a positive outlook and a more laid-back approach to life. This very philosophy, which at first can seem counterintuitive when talking about highly-stressful film productions, makes the country such a great contender to host them: Local business owners and crews are clear-headed, highly adaptable and eager to help to the best of their ability.
United We Stand, Divided We Fall
While other — mostly larger — countries see a competition between their regions when it comes to attracting large-scale productions, Costa Rica is a surprisingly and refreshingly united nation. Locals, from small villages to bigger cities, affectionately call each other “comrades” or “fellows,” and shine a light on each other’s businesses at every given opportunity. This tangible sense of collaboration gives security to those looking to bring larger productions to a country still building a track record in the field. The neighboring attitude is also reflected continent-wise, with the film festival expanding its competitive sections to all of Central America this year.
Costa Rica Media Market Beats Targets
The rebooted, rebranded market held over June 24-25, surpassed its targets. According to Costa Rica Film Commissioner Marysela Zamora, the market hosted 302 delegates when the original goal was 200 and 735 business meetings took place when the target was 500.
The hotel venue was a popular choice as it was near the airport, an extensive park and the cultural center of the city. “We hope to add one more day next year and attract more locals,” she said, adding that they were in talks with Uruguay to bring in a delegation.
Miguel Gómez of Atómica Films, Costa Rica Film Commissioner Marysela Zamora, Grupo Morbido CEO Pablo Guisa (l-r) Courtesy of Costa Rica Media Market
Horror Rules: Costa Rica Fantastic Lab
Grupo Morbido and Fantastic Pavilion partnered with the Costa Rica Media Market to launch Fantastic Lab Costa Rica, an initiative aimed at fostering genre filmmaking in the region. Starting next year, the lab will offer six selected projects hands-on training and professional internships, in collaboration with local production company Atómica Films. Led by filmmaker Miguel Gómez (“El Sanatorio”), Atómica will produce a proof of concept for the winning project, which will be presented at Cannes’ Marché du Film. This year, the Morbido Cine Fantasy Film Showcase launches in Costa Rica, along with workshops – featuring special effects makeup this edition. “Latin Americans – especially those from Central America and the Caribbean – have the potential to make a global impact by embracing the horror genre,” said Morbido Group CEO, Pablo Guisa.
I Think This is the Beginning of a Beautiful Friendship
After six fam trips fanned out across the country following the Costa Rica Media Market, some of its participants came back inspired to film their next projects in the locations they visited. Uruguay’s Juan Feldman (“The Prey”), who has made four feature films in Costa Rica, is set on making his fifth at the San Ramon cloud forest reserve. “Sometimes the location informs the script as in this case; I plan on writing a story set here,” he says. For L.A.-based producers Tom Donahue of Creative Chaos (“Mafia Spies”) and Arnon Manor of Chemical Soup (“Quarter”), visiting the resorts in the Guanacaste region inspired them to team up on a project set in one of them. “Tom and I had talked about collaborating for a while, but it was this trip that truly inspired us. Experiencing the beauty and drama of Costa Rica’s geography made it clear we had to shoot here,” said Manor. “The enthusiasm of Marysela Zamora, the film commissioner, along with the passion of the local industry, really cemented our desire to set a project in Costa Rica. We believe in the potential, and we’re excited to be part of that journey,” Donahue added.
Andy van Veen of ND Pictures also connected with Costa Rican Esteban Quesada of EQV Film Services to produce two projects Van Veen plans to shoot in the country.
Tres Puertos Costa Rica
Genre films took center stage at this year’s Tres Puertos Costa Rica development lab, now in its third edition. Running June 18-23 ahead of the Costa Market Media Market and the country’s annual film festival, the lab’s current lineup of 12 projects explored a range of queer and fantasy themes, according to founder and director Erick González. Several projects that launched at the Costa Rica lab have since moved into production or post, including “Madre Pájaro” by Costa Rica’s Sofía Quiroz, whose debut feature “Land of Ashes” screened at Cannes Critics’ Week; “Corte Culebra,” the second feature from Panama’s Ana Elena Tejera (“Panquiaco”), and “Gigante” by Colombia’s Sebastián Pinzón and Canela Reyes.
