Agustin Banchero’s preparing for a global vacation…
FiGa Films, a leading Miami-based international sales and distribution company, has picked up worldwide sales rights to the 32-year-old Uruguayan filmmaker’s debut feature Las Vacaciones de Hilda.
“The film was part of this year’s San Sebastian International Film Festival’s [work in progress section] Cine en Construcciónand blew us away,” said FiGa Films’ Sandro Fiorin, adding: “It is the most mature first feature I’ve seen in years.”
Produced by Virginia Boglioloand Juan Alvarez Nemeof auteur-driven Uruguayan shingle, Tarkiofilm, Las Vacaciones de Hilda centers on the titular character whose self-imposed solitary life is upended when she hears that her son, whom she hasn’t seen in years, is coming to visit. The abrupt cancellation of his visit triggers memories of a past summer.
“Her memories of a particular summer spark an emotional pivot for the character,” said Banchero whose inspiration for his film primarily stemmed from his need to understand people close to him. Through its five years of development, it evolved into a nuanced exploration of memory, on understanding how the past affects the present. “It became more of a philosophical search,” he said. As it had to be shot in the winter and summer, he filmed it in two parts with a year’s break in between. “That break was fortuitous as it allowed me to reflect on what I had filmed and see it from a fresh perspective,” he mused.
Born in Montevideo, Banchero earned a filmmaking degree from the Film School of Uruguayafter which he directed a series of short films, including De Las Casas Blancas, which screened at the LLAFin London and the World Cinema Festin Amsterdam, among others. Other shorts followed, led by Las Perdidas, which played the Malba Festivalin Buenos Aires.
