JS: It grew quicker
than you thought?
DL: Yes, very fast.
If one talks to organizers of other festivals they tell of the
years it took them to bring them up. It took little for us
because remember that we’re talking about a territory that’s
given to the study of cinema, business, space. It is a virgin
market. A market that is urgent to have a different offer.
JS: How do you feel
on the business and producer side with Ambulante? What future do
you see?
DL: Much. Ambulante has been winning by
its efforts. I don’t know how to tell you as a businessman,
because I don’t see a fifth of the return. What I know is that
it no longer costs me, and it gives me pride that it now
functions on it’s own. As a spectator, the idea that there is
cinema like this in theatres excites me quite a bit.
And I love the sensation of being
able to chat about different films.
JS: What’s so
important to show as much as you can to express documentary?
DL: It’s
simply another way to make cinema that’s sometimes much more
direct with the public. The movie makes you stay or go. 35 pesos
are not worth spending two bad hours; if you take an hour and
haven’t been entertained, you leave. Then the only thing that
there is to tell people is to trust in the selection that we’re
making. That they come and give it an opportunity at the
festival.
JS: Who
participates in the selection process?
DL: More than talking about those
who take part in the selection, its necessary to say that we
have people completely devoted to this. We are very fond of
comfort because we travel. In general, the people who organize
Ambulante spend the whole year waiting for what happens in a
world that they don’t deal with either. You have to go look for
it. Additionally, they are volunteers who give their time to us
because they believe in the project. It is the most beautiful
effort of this festival: we talk in interviews, but in fact, one
owes what happens to the people who put the whole day into this.
JS: What is
the principal learning of Ambulante?
DL: That if you are not armed well, with time its very probable
that the festival will swallow you. It is powerful cinema, but
with great diversity because its done with few resources. So you
can keep traveling in a cinema that does not become anything.
Obtaining the treasure takes time. We’ve
learned that the festival begins when last year’s ends. It takes
you at least ten months.
JS: Some
faculty of the genre that you appreciate?
DL:
Documentary film can be equipped with an art and a sensitive
story that captures you. The art of cinema takes root in how it
is told. It is not a journalistic labor. There are no new or
different stories. Cinema takes many years. It has already told
nearly everything. The idea is in the profound thing that it can
become.
Translated by Heather
