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Newark Museum Showcases Latino Films

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  • Newark Museum Showcases Latino Films

    Newark Museum Showcases Latino Films

    Fri Oct 1,10:25 AM ET

    By STEVE STRUNSKY, Associated Press Writer

    NEWARK, N.J. - Moviegoers are most likely to associate the Newark
    Museum with the annual Black Film Festival it has hosted for the past
    30 years.

    But this weekend the museum will acknowledge the growing influence of
    Hispanic culture on New Jersey and film with its first annual Cinema
    Latino festival.


    The three-day festival begins at 7 p.m. Friday with a screening of
    "Bought and Sold," a feature film set in Jersey City, written and
    directed by Michael Tolajian.

    Saturday's bill, beginning at 5 p.m., includes two features, "Ballad
    of a Soldier," directed by Kinan Valdez, and "Manito," written and
    directed by Eric Eason. A short film, "White Like the Moon," written
    and directed by Marina Gonzalez Palmier, also will be shown.

    The festival concludes with a Sunday matinee, a 2:30 p.m. screening of
    the documentary "Santo Domingo Blues: Los Tigueres de la Bachata,"
    written and directed by Alex Wolfe.

    "We are making efforts to reach a Latino population here in New
    Jersey, but we also are interested in reaching out to people making
    independent film," said Carmen Ramos, the museum's assistant curator
    for cultural engagement, and the festival's principal organizer. "It's
    also a reflection of trends that are happening nationwide."

    Ramos said the museum's annual Black Film Festival is among the oldest
    in the country for African-American cinema. The 30th annual festival
    in June included a screening of the 2002 Spike Lee documentary, "Jim
    Brown (news): All American," with a personal appearance by Brown, the
    NFL Hall of Fame running back who became an actor and activist.

    "The Black Film Festival had different goals," said Ramos. "When it
    started, it was because black actors and directors and writers
    couldn't get their stuff in the theaters, with the film festival
    business actually being operated as a discovery tool."

    "Now," Ramos added, "with growth of the Latino market, especially here
    in this state and in other parts of the country, I think the emphasis
    is a little different."

    Ramos said the goal of the Latino festival is to engage educators,
    artists, professionals and the community at large in a creative
    discussion that might inspire actors, writers, directors and producers
    of Latino cinema. In other words, the festival seeks to be part of the
    creative process, rather than simply a distribution aid, she said.

    The festival avoids defining Latino cinema, recognizing the complex
    nature of Latino culture and identity, said Ramos, who was born in the
    Bronx to parents originally from the Dominican Republic.

    The opening feature, "Bought and Sold," which premiered at the 2003
    Tribeca Film Festival in Manhattan, exemplifies the Newark festival's
    flexibility. For example, Tolajian, the film's director, is not
    Latino.

    "I'm 100 percent Americanized Armenian," said Tolajian, who lives in
    Maplewood.

    But the film's young star, Rafael Sardina, is Puerto Rican, as is his
    character, Ray-Ray.

    "The story itself takes place in Jersey City. There's an
    African-American, an Asian, an Armenian," said Tolajian. "He's the
    center point, of course, but it's kind of how all these racial or
    ethnic groups interplay in this coming-of-age story."

    Tolajian said he would not label "Bought and Sold" a Latino film
    himself, but he doesn't mind if others do.

    "I think distributors, they need an audience to get it out there, they
    need a particular audience," he said. "If they have to target it to an
    urban or Latino market, I don't mind it."
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