CoyoteMoon Films presents
written & directed by Howard Allen
The official trailer is now up on youtube - Se Habla Español Trailer
CoyoteMoon Film's “Christmas Present To And From Tucson” the Se Habla Español DVD is now available!. In addition to Se Habla Español the DVD features Even A Gringa Can Make A Tamale (complete with recipes), a detailed look Behind The Scenes and a Ken Burns-style photo montage, Tucson: Two Cultures, featuring Tucson’s best photographers.
Se Habla Español DVD - $15.00 (includes shipping & handling)
Angelica (Jessica Montalvo) becomes a powerful connection between Anglo and Hispanic cultures in this day-in-the-life film poem. Filmed on location in Tucson, Aizona and the Mission San Xavier del Bac.
Se Habla Español is a very contemporary film poem in 3 scenes that follows the wonderful Angelica through one very moving day in her life.
At work in La Buena Tortilleria, she is comically harassed by all her usual customers including an old couple who cannot wait for the hangover cure, Menudo, and a wealthy Anglo couple from the Foothills "dangerously" venturing out for something they know nothing about: Christmas tamales. Angelica translates for everyone's Spanish and English and calms the chaos.
At her lunch break, our hero makes another bridge between cultures in her painful attempts to help a frightened young man, Jorge who's been left downtown but missed his connection with a Coyote. He's illegal, exhausted and dehydrated but desperate to appear "normal" and an English speaker. She gets him food and water. They connect. In different circumstances, they might. . . but she cannot help him as he leaves following her directions to the bus to the mysterious Oro Valley. She cannot help but cry.
After work, she goes to early Mass at Mission San Xavier but her life as a Culture Bridge catches up to her. Two tourist ladies off a bus from Illinois sit next to her and soon discover the Mass is in Spanish. Angelica has to help them and translate. The priest's homily is on the Good Samaritan, which only reminds Angelica how she could not help Jorge. Seeing her pain, the ladies are happy to tell her they know the Good Samaritan. After the Mass, they thank her and cheer her up. For the first time we learn her name is Angelica and for the first time all day she truly can smile. As she leaves toward the Stations Of the Cross hill, the camera cuts to the hill and pans slowly down to the amazing Mission in the gold light of late afternoon.
*** Read the Se Habla Español blog ***