![]() Missed any other outputs from Recommendation Machine? You can read every past version here. Other Fans: In this LA Times interview with Yolanda Machado, Guerrero talks about the way language plays a part in “Culture Shock,” both in her push for how Spanish is used on-screen, and how on-set conversations helped get across a more authentic idea of what the title truly represented. With plenty of places to rent/stream the others, “Culture Shock” is one of ten titles from the last half-decade ready to jumpstart a handful of different queues. Gigi Saul Guerrero is set to direct Jenni, a movie about the life of Mexican American singer Jenni Rivera. Pair It With: Last fall, Carlos Aguilar wrote this extremely helpful primer on recent Latinx horror films. In the process, “Culture Shock” finds a potent way to address trauma and identity and control, all without shying away from its real-world connections. It’s not a neat one-to-one comparison, but this approach to a supposed idyllic town that’s hiding something dark underneath makes other recent attempts pale in comparison. (Extra credit also to the sound team for making a bite from a piece of pizza sound like a crunching animal carcass.) All these choices are deployed in confident, simple, and unabashedly unsubtle ways that point to the menace within the metaphor. This is all made manifest with a slew of genre touches - robotic Stepfordized movement, an “I Got You Babe” approach to the national anthem, some haunting close-ups of eyes, glitching faces - that would seem stale if they weren’t put to such effective use. Each new erased personal detail or phrase from the national slogan handbook (Barbara Crampton makes “You’re in America now, the Land of Plenty” sound more sinister than it’s ever been) is one more layer that Marisol has to both recognize and contend with. The way that Guerrero leans into that artifice, showing that this new soup of patriotism and sameness is its own waking nightmare, is another textbook bit of unsettling escalation. After college, she co-founded the independent production company. ![]() in motion picture production at Capilano University. Born in Mexico City, Saul Guerrero immigrated to Canada, where she earned a B.A. It’s a ‘50s backlot view of Americana that she instantly recognizes as off-kilter. Gigi Saul Guerrero is making a name for herself in horror films as a director and writer breaking new ground. After traveling under cover of darkness (DP Byron Werner lights some of those sections as if Marisol and her companions are moving through an endless void with only lantern light to guide them), Marisol wakes up in a pastel-drenched neighborhood that’s suburbia, heartland, and old-money colonial all rolled into one. It’s a harrowing opening that Guerrero expertly flips on its head once Marisol arrives at her destination. “Culture Shock” shows why Marisol is choosing to leave her home while also showing the potential perils of a journey to the border, with plenty of people along the way preying on bodies and savings and hope itself. The opening third is one that Guerrero tells in an unflinching way, following Marisol (Martha Higareda) as she tries to make her way to the Mexican-American border. ‘What We Do in the Shadows’ Killed Season 5 - with Kindness
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