Niños del paraíso

In 1995, the Chilean state made a grave mistake when it detained Marcelina (68), an Indigenous spiritual authority, a machi of the Mapuche people. The police stripped her of her jewelry and traditional clothing and sent her to a men’s prison despite her identifying as a woman. She was unjustly accused of murdering a patient through witchcraft, triggering feelings that led her to leave her community, even after her innocence was proven. Thirty years later, Cons (34) delves into her story—into a world foreign to her—confronting lessons and prejudices she had never known.

More than sixty years after leaving high school, former classmates Alicia, Gema, Angelica, Ximena and Maria Teresa are still devoted to their regular catch-ups in which they exchange gossip and reminiscences over elaborately presented afternoon teas. Impeccably turned out, the ladies’ free-wheeling tea-time chats run the gamut from mortality and marital infidelity to soccer and twerking.

They are women. They are mothers. They are inmates serving long sentences in a prison in Chile. Their children grow up far from them, but remain in their hearts. In prison they find the affection of other inmates who share their same experience. Mutual support among these women becomes a form of resistance and emancipation. Malqueridas reconstructs their stories through the images they themselves shot with cell phones prohibited inside the prison, recovering the collective memory of a forgotten community.

Follows Chilean artist Alfredo Jaar as he finds his artistic voice and develops the socially critical perspective of his work.

The first feature from Alison McAlpine is a dialogue with the heavens—in this case, the heavens above the Andes and the Atacama Desert in northern Chile, where she alights on the desert- and mountain-dwelling astronomers, fishermen, miners, and cowboys who live their lives with reverence and awe for the skies.

Marcia, granddaughter of Salvador Allende, the first democratic socialist president who was overthrown by the Army in September 1973, seeks to reconstruct the personal and familiar image of her grandfather, buried by his historical person, her exile and the family pain.

Mauricio, a lifeguard on a Chilean beach, considers himself to be a model of efficiency and professionalism. His colleagues, however, think otherwise, and speculate on why he never goes into the water. Maite Alberdi's visually gorgeous feature documentary debut has the intensity of a short story; beginning as a quirky character study of lifeguards and beachgoers, it becomes something altogether darker and more shocking when events take a dramatic turn.

The comedian Timoteo is the leader of a cross-dresser circus that has toured through Chile for forty years. Today his advanced age and health are reason for concern regarding the continuity of the show.

The Amateur Soccer Referee Federation has a new board of directors, who face the challenge of renewing their image after a 90-year history. But these leaders receive a broke organization and headquarters that are in precarious conditions. They have also aged, but have nothing to lose and will work together to reinvent themselves.

Iselsa and Cathy decided to be part of a project designed by leaders of social architecture, who will give them their own home and integrate them into a middle class neighborhood. The camera observes for 7 years: the lack of resources, a neighborhood that rejects them, problems in construction and the disaster caused by the rains. The most difficult thing will be to overcome the division of the community.

An account of the experiences by poet and National Literature Award laureate Raúl Zurita, during his travels and his daily life, as he reflects on topics such as state terrorism and death

The fuzzy boundaries between sanity and insanity in an isolated Christian group come to light when one of its members dies in strange circumstances. Since then, a harsh judicial process jeopardizes their fate as a group. A story about faith and social prejudices.

Juan Carlos is a lonko who has fought in defense of Mapuche autonomy. Many question him because he agreed to work for the government in order to improve conditions in his community. At home he shares his concerns, while his animals watch the tension grow and the seasons advance.

Committed to unearthing her ancestors' silenced history, Margarita embarks on a profound journey, guided by the diary of Katrulaf, an indigenous Mapuche prisoner of war. She retraces the Mapuches’ deportation route, and in unearthing these pasts, gives voice to a displaced people and the genocide inflicted upon them during the military invasions that founded Argentina and Chile.

Haydee has been seeking justice for victims of human rights violations for 40 years caused by Pinochet’s regime, but today she faces her most intimate battle, the end of a long trial that condemns her torturers, the murderers of the son she carried in her womb. Along the way, health problems will bring back memories of her darkest days.

A mother who lost her memory. Her best friend, kidnapped and disappeared being pregnant. A daughter who tries to rescue them. A reflection upon friendship, motherhood and loss.