On Tuesday, two Latin American Revolution films won an award at the Locarno Open Door prize ceremony. These two films showed the altered mindset of cineasts as they questioned wisdom among new inventions.

Pantasma, directed by Gloria Carrión and produced by Leonor Zuñiga, won the biggest cash prize of CHF25,000 ($28,600) from Visions Sud Est. The film is based on the memoirs of former Sandinista – Felix Vigil. During the Sandinista-Contra War, he realized that the revolution was not fighting the paid mercenaries but the Nicaraguan peasants, which made him question his beliefs. Carrión and Zuñiga could not film in Nicaragua, so the film is done with stop-motion animation. They included a mix of archival footage, photos, and video art.

Three Bullets (Tres Balas) took home multiple awards, including a cash prize of CHF20,000 (22,000). The film is an investigative piece on Lucretia Pérez, a Dominican immigrant shot and killed in 1992 by four Neo-Nazis. Director Genésis Valenzuela said, “The driving force of this film is the desire for emancipation, both from the constraints of existence and from those of filmmaking.” During this time, Valenzuela is finding her identity as a “human being/woman/Afro-Caribbean/filmmaker.” The film mixes a documentary, fiction, and an essay on displacement, criminal investigation, and colonial history.

Here are the list of winners:

2023 Open Doors Grant – Desidia (Leandro Grillo).

CNC Development Grant – LOA. Kill Your Master (LOA. Marta a tus amos, Carlos Zerpa).

Prix ArteKino International and the Open Doors- World Cinema Fund Audience Strategy Award – Three Bullets (Valenzuela).

The Sørfond Award – Libertines (Libertinas, Leslie Ortiz).

The Rotterdam Lab Award – Ivana Urízar.

Open Doors – BR Lab Award – Last of Kings (El últino Rey, Victor Checa)

Open Doors – OIF-ACP-EU Award – Raised by Goats

Open Doors – LEXIA Insights Award – Milky Way

Open Doors – Moulin d’Andé-CECI Award – Carlos Ormeño Palma