Isidore Bethel

Directing

Isidore Bethel

Born January 1, 1989 (age 37)

Isidore Bethel is an editor, director, and producer whom Filmmaker named one of the "25 New Faces of Independent Film" in 2020. His work uses filmmaking to make sense of overwhelming experiences and touches on recurrent themes of displacement, grief, therapy, aging, trauma, and sexuality. His first feature film as director, Liam, premiered at the Boston LGBT Film Festival in 2018 and received the …

Known For

Horse WranglerHorse Wrangler · 2018
Horse Wrangler
6.02018
MovieDocumentary
Nando, a young horse wrangler in a rural Mexican village, has taken his own life following a disagreement with his father. Caballerango shows the boy’s family members and townspeople as they reckon with the new realities borne out of this inexplicable tragedy. Each account of Nando’s story reveals a different aspect of this rural town, which is deeply affected by modernization. The confrontation between the centuries-old ways of life and the modern-day world seems to be creating serious identity crises among the younger generation. The story is told in a patient, observational style with methodical shots of the landscape, ranches, and of the two white horses, whom Nando and his father tended to. Those horses, the last to see Nando alive, connect us to an ethereal sensation of almost otherworldly mystical beings.
HummingbirdsHummingbirds · 2023
Hummingbirds
7.02023
MovieDocumentary
Best friends Silvia and Beba record their lives as they dance, make music, and face an uncertain immigration process in Texas near the Mexican border.
What Comes from Sitting in Silence?What Comes from Sitting in Silence? · 2026
What Comes from Sitting in Silence?
2026
MovieDocumentary
From a cramped Mumbai storefront, Khatoon leads Mumbai's first women-led Islamic court. Amidst heated arguments and raw testimony, these female judges settle cases of domestic conflict, reclaiming religious law from male dominance to offer a new path toward grassroots justice.
Acts of LoveActs of Love · 2021
Acts of Love
4.42021
MovieDocumentaryRomance
When his older boyfriend loses interest in him, the filmmaker relocates to Chicago and uses dating apps to cast new lovers in an amorphous project that his mother hates.
unseenunseen · 2023
unseen
2023
MovieDocumentary
An aspiring social worker, Pedro must confront political restrictions as a blind, undocumented immigrant to get his college degree and support his family. But when attaining his dreams leads to new and unexpected challenges, what will Pedro do?
Hollow TreeHollow Tree · 2022
Hollow Tree
2022
MovieDocumentary
Hollow Tree follows three teenagers coming of age in their sinking homeland of Louisiana. For the first time, they notice the Mississippi River’s engineering, stumps of cypress trees, and billowing smokestacks. Their different perspectives — as Indigenous, white, and Angolan young women — shape their story of the climate crisis.
The Taste of MangoThe Taste of Mango · 2024
The Taste of Mango
2024
MovieDocumentary
In this hypnotically cinematic love letter flowing through time and generations, director Chloe Abrahams probes raw questions her mother and grandmother have long brushed aside, tenderly untangling painful knots in her family’s unspoken past.
Maintenant et iciMaintenant et ici · 2021
Maintenant et ici
2021
MovieDocumentary
An intimate portrait of the Franco-Iranian painter Davoud Ghanbariha, filmed in the outskirts of Paris. Through a dialogue between his voice and his paintings, Maintenant et ici explores memory, exile, and the act of creation as a fragile bridge between past and present.

Filmography

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Horse WranglerHorse Wrangler · 2018
Horse Wrangler
6.02018
MovieDocumentary
Nando, a young horse wrangler in a rural Mexican village, has taken his own life following a disagreement with his father. Caballerango shows the boy’s family members and townspeople as they reckon with the new realities borne out of this inexplicable tragedy. Each account of Nando’s story reveals a different aspect of this rural town, which is deeply affected by modernization. The confrontation between the centuries-old ways of life and the modern-day world seems to be creating serious identity crises among the younger generation. The story is told in a patient, observational style with methodical shots of the landscape, ranches, and of the two white horses, whom Nando and his father tended to. Those horses, the last to see Nando alive, connect us to an ethereal sensation of almost otherworldly mystical beings.

Consulting Producer

So Late So SoonSo Late So Soon · 2020
So Late So Soon
5.02020
MovieDocumentary
Chicago artists Jackie and Don Seiden are a half-century into their marriage, time spent creating distinct yet congruous bodies of work. Jackie makes art of everything around her. Central to her practice is a recognition of the fragility of materials. That conceptual interest has turned into daily reality, as both her body and one of her most ambitious art projects, her canary-yellow Victorian house, start to fall apart. Don’s work reveals a mind resigned to death. He has always been interested in the rules of nature, and now he finds himself facing inevitable health scares. So Late So Soon is a sensitively constructed, playful character study that honors Jackie and Don’s art, and even becomes a part of it, while also locating in it glimmers of their essence.

Associate Producer