by John D. Bess
Daily Lobo
Over the weekend, Madstone Theaters launched its Film Forward series - six independent films without distributors that can only be seen at Madstone.
One of these films, "Te Amo," was made in Chile and examines teenage angst as four friends refurbish an abandoned house in the Chilean countryside, using it as a haven from the troubles in their own homes.
Starring director Sergio Castilla's son, Adrian Castilla, in the lead role as the sexually-abused Samuel, the film is shot with a mixture of hand-held digital video footage and traditional film, and told with a mÇlange of Spanish, English and Spanglish.
Language barriers serve as a filter blocking full, honest communication between the film's characters. As the four teens became more intertwined, opening up to each other and including each other in their secrets, two gringo boys, Mike and Sam, begin to speak Spanish more and eventually speak it exclusively for the last portion of the film.
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A similar metaphorical filter was used visually as the kids shoot their exploits at the house using a digital video camera. A great deal of exposition is shown through the hand-held camera. The kids themselves use it not only to portray how they feel about their problems, but they also used the camera to work through them.
In the same way that English disappears, the film eventually weeds the digital video camera out and the story is told exclusively through film.
Castilla was on hand after the showing to speak with the audience about his film.
Daily Lobo: Did you make a conscious effort to have Sam and Mike stop speaking English when you wrote the script?
Sergio Castilla: Yes, in a way. At first the American kids are playing on the idea that they are Americans - they are above suspicion or above any problems and they make fun of the Chileans. But that's very superficial, that's not very deep.
When things get real and they get deeper into their own things then they become very real, and language is going to become the key to them all sharing. They want to tell the truth, so they are going to want to integrate and share language.
D.L.: Was it also a conscious decision to remove the filter of the digital video camera from the storytelling?
S.C.: Yes, they were too caught up in their own troubles to be watching themselves. The observation was replaced by action and they all do what they have to do at that point.
D.L.: What was it like directing your son?
S.C.: Well, it was like directing another actor. You just basically relate on the set and on rehearsals on the level of actor and character and leave the person out. And in the case of my son, sometimes while we're not working we would relate personally.
Sometimes, the way adolescents are, they challenge you. And in the end we had some shouting matches. But, he won those shouting matches. I cannot win - there's no way you're going to win. It's impossible. He has more energy than me so I need to save my energy for the shoot.
D.L: The house seems to play an important role in the film, more so than just a location from which to tell a story.
S.C.: It's about teens having some place to go. People used to hang out on the streets, now they hang out at the malls so there's always places where they feel comfortable, where they can go hang out away from their home. It's about finding their own space. It's a symbol. It's an abandoned house, and it's what they do with it. So, it's homes that don't count anymore and are revived.
Like these kids revived the home, they fixed this, they fixed that. So it's a space, instead of building it up from scratch they take something they found. Then in the end, you notice, it gets torn down. Its purpose was served.
