SPOTLIGHT: New Mexico Filmmakers

Zen and the Future of the Wild West

New Mexico and New Mexicans in the year 2073 don’t look much different than they do in the year 2005. In the not so distant future, New Mexicans still live in crumbling adobe shacks, eat carne seca, don sarapes and cowboy hats, drive presumed macho sports cars from the mid 1980s, and speak in pidgin Spanglish. It would appear that in the future, New Mexico still lags a few years behind the rest of the world...and the rest of the universe for that matter.

However, there are subtle differences between contemporary New Mexico and New Mexico of the future. Bilious trolls with towering mounds of hair and jagged horns play chess with their heavily-accented neighbors. Scavenger coyotes are replaced by goon squads of cosmic hit men, dispatched to hunt intergalactic mischief makers. And, in the vein of Robo-Cop, humans-turned-cyborgs are equipped with extrasensory faculties, their human emotions replaced with enhanced intelligence and superordinate killing abilities. And, as a means of transport, space ships preferred over lowriders.

The New Mexico of the future, as Daniel Otero and Javier Arellano see it, remains desolate, sparsely populated terra. However, in their film Zen and the Asteroid, the pair have done something most native New Mexicans rarely do: they’ve transformed their backyard into a movie set.

Zen, Otero and Arellano’s long-running project, made its debut at the 2005 Santa Fe Film Festival where it received a fair number of laughs. It has since been screened at theaters in Albuquerque (The Guild), Santa Fe and Espanola.

Whereas most Hollywood films shot in New Mexico rarely capture the true spirit of the state, Otero and Arellano show the heart of New Mexico and their relation to it. Films like All the Pretty Horses, 21 Grams, and The Longest Yard were all shot in Northern New Mexico, but these movies fixate on New Mexico as an uninteresting territory riddled with bleak landscapes, cacti, and undeniable traces of Old Mexico. However, the bulky equipment of Hollywood films, along with the demand for tenured actors, gives these films an erroneous quality because they a) rarely use New Mexican actors and b) only shoot parts of the state that are readily accessible. For that reason, Hollywood renditions of New Mexico seem fairly synthetic.

Though Zen only had a budget of $10,000, Arellano and Otero, who originally met circa 1986, know how to film the Land of Enchantment, and they do so by using gritty digital camera, inexperienced actors, and overexposed lighting. Whereas most filmmakers would argue that these factors are impediments to the filmmaking process, Otero and Arellano embrace them and apply them accordingly to create a realistic picture of the American southwest. New Mexico is gritty, full of awkward characters, and a bit overexposed. Even if Zen is set 68 years in the future, it is a realistic relay of sensory impressions unique to New Mexico...or at least it is once you get past that people are levitating, teleporting, and speaking to holograms!

But how does one channel the espiritu of New Mexico onto the big screen?

“The magical realism of New Mexican mysticism factors greatly into Zen and the Asteroid,” Otero said in an online interview. “I'm a completely new-school film maker. I’m inspired by well made art. I’m still learning, still earning a reputation, but have no shortage of creative ideas. Hopefully, folks will know what a 'Dan Otero' movie is in the future.” And if Otero continues to create films as unique as Zen, this fantasy has the potential of becoming a reality, even if the bizarre circumstances that occur in Zen - kung-fu action on an asteroid, falling to earth from space and surviving - never will.

It should come as no surprise that Otero’s first cinematic memory is of seeing the original Star Wars in 1977. But what is surprising is that he’s not really a movie buff. This doesn’t impeded him from understanding the power of film. “I like making movies more than I like movies,” he said when asked what type of films he gravitates toward as an audience member. “The Dalai Lama first saw a film projector as a kid in his Tibetan village and was blown away. He immediately realized the potential for spreading compassion via this medium. Any human instinct or emotion can be displayed (and abused) via [film].”

When asked what advice he gives to the cast of Zen, none of whom are professional actors, Otero said he often finds himself saying, "That was great, but let me see more Eyebrow action."

Zen a self-described “Taoist, sci-fi comedy” is, like most independent films, an obvious stepping stone for its filmmakers. And with such a meager budget and unsophisticated equipment, it’s unjust to hold the film to the same standards of bloated CG affairs like King Kong and War of the Worlds. Furthermore, to criticize the film for its corny special effects is to miss the point of Zen entirely. Zen is a different breed of sci-fi - personality sci-fi - a genre that is as much about New Mexican idiosyncrasy and unconventional camera angles than it is about how gadgetry of the future will alter the world around us.

As for Otero, who has worked on dozens of projects as a producer, writer, director, musician, and editor, he may, like the characters of his film, have an exciting future ahead of him.




Chris Roybal Says 'Hello' with a 'Goodbye'

Chris Roybal is trying with all his might to make it in the big leagues. Like Otero and Arellano, Roybal is a New Mexican native. However unlike the auteurs behind Zen and the Asteroid, Roybal currently resides in California, though he came back to New Mexico to make his film. At at SFFF reception, Roybal mentioned that, unfortunately, California is simply a better place to be for filmmakers who want to succeed.

“I have no reservations in telling people that I want to be famous,” Roybal said with earnest jocularity. “I want to be remembered, leave a legacy. My goals as a filmmaker revolve around reaching as many people as possible to not only gain some sort of notoriety but to benefit those people who have stood by me throughout my life and who deserve to be happy.”

Roybal’s short-film “Our First Goodbye” was selected by the judges at SFFF 2005 to air the week before the actual festival as part of a local parade of New Mexico pics at the Cinema Cafe.

“Our First Goodbye” is a touching film about a man who is forced to come to terms with the consequences of his actions. The protagonist, Thomas Hart (Jeff Padilla, another native New Mexican), is, to be blunt, a man too immature and whiny to accept that he’s done something that warrants harsh punishment.

Much like Ray Joshua (Saul Williams) in Slam and Monty Brogan (Ed Norton) in Spike Lee’s 25th Hour, Hart is a man who has broken the law and is now faced with an impending jail sentence. However, to complicate matters, Hart’s girlfriend is pregnant and his forthcoming 15-year prison stint is looming overhead, creating tension between himself and everyone he knows. In an attempt to not alienate himself from his daughter, Hart, a former television producer, sets out ot create a biopic of his life, his motives in the crimes he committed, and the beauty of his relationship with his unborn child’s mother, Karen (Victoria Gale). Hart’s intention is to create a video that his child can watch in order to gain understanding as to why her father is en absencia.

“I’ve often said that the greatest goal I have as a filmmaker is to make people fall in love,” Roybal said when asked what he strives for as a filmmaker. “[I want people to] fall in love with something, somebody, whatever. I want to make people tingle in that dark movie theater. If I can make films with certain moments that make people totally melt or swell with some overwhelming feeling, I’ve done my job. Good film making should come down to telling interesting stories about interesting people with passion.”

And how have you come to understand storytelling and passion?

“How I tell stories and the type of characters that fill these stories with have been influenced the most by New Mexico. [The people] have depth, strength. They’re fragile, weak, but altogether innocent. Simple. NM is simple to me, and though it may not seem that way, my films to me are simple in the same ways also. I like that. Growing up in northern NM is 100 percent different than anywhere else I’ve been,” Roybal stated. “The people, the culture, everything. When I think of [NM], I think of a real earthy, natural, slow, quiet beauty. I’d like to think my cinematic style reflects that. There’s an honesty to where I come from. Not like in cities where everyone puts on masks, where [the people have] lost a sense of self and culture. Northern NM...is precious in a way.”

The most engaging aspect of “Our First Goodbye” is Roybal’s ability to capture the “quiet beauty” and “simplicity” of New Mexico with a series of slowly-panning images. “Our First Goodbye” should be lauded, if for nothing else, for its attention to setting and the flawless cinematographic presentation.

Set entirely on the Santa Fe plaza, Roybal’s short is amazing to watch. In shooting the plaza, Roybal captured all of the area’s magnetism by shooting a movie that focuses so intensely on the historicity of the aesthetics all else falls to the wayside. Roybal has an undeniable talent frame a shot well enough to make you forget what you’re seeing is representational and not the real thing. “My father’s passion is photography,” he said, “always has been. I think I get a part of it from [him].”

But a movie is nothing without it’s characters and though Hart may not be the most likable man in the world (he’s full of antagonistic delusions and denials) his circumstances keep you interested in the film.

Hart claims he’s remorseful for his actions, his contrition never quite comes across as genuine; he appears to lament his misdeeds not because what he did was wrong, but because he simply doesn’t see his the conditions of his punishment as justice being served. Hart is essentially pouty, preachy and irresponsible, and his juvenile attitude is further demonstrated by the fact that he directly blames his crimes on his unborn child and Karen (as evidenced by his rhetorical “passing-the-buck” phrase: “I did this all for you.”).

However, despite a few minor character flaws in the film’s protagonist, “Our First Goodbye” is a touching effort, and the final scene is heartfelt and promising.

“Movies serve as a way for people to release,” Roybal said, speaking both about movies in general and the film Hart himself was making. “People enjoy movies both for the feelings they get from watching them and for the feelings they can ignore while they escape their world and live in a fantasy. It’s nice to be un-deep sometimes. To watch others live. Movies let us do that and are a way to capture beauty, in whatever form it may be, and relive it over and over again.” And with any luck, Roybal will give audiences a chance to escape into his future projects over and over again.