The Guadalajara International Film Festival (FICG) concluded June 9 with the handing out of gongs to the best films in multiple categories.
The Mezcal Award for Best Mexican Film went to “Heroico,” directed by David Zonana, which centers on Luis, an 18-year-old boy with indigenous roots who enters the Heroico Colegio Militar (military college), in the hope of ensuring a better future for himself. However, he encounters a rigid and institutionally violent system designed to turn him into a perfect soldier. Zonana said his film “tries to show the dangers that can exist by giving the Army so much power. I hope it will help persuade to society to demand accountability for abuses inside and outside the institution.”
Mexican director Gisela Delgadillo won two awards for her documentary “Kenya,” the emotional journey and fight for justice of a trans woman sex worker who witnessed the murder of her friend Paola by a hate crime attacker. At the ceremony, reflecting that “life has taken my best friends from me,” Kenya Cuevas, the activist who inspired the documentary, stressed the importance of making transphobia and structural violence toward the LGBTIQ+ community more visible, stating that “human rights are not negotiable.”
In the “Made in Jalisco” category, the best short film award went to 22-year-old Guadalajara native Gabriel Esdras for “Él, detrás del arma,” a story about two brothers caught up in the chaos of violent local protests against police abuse. The best feature, partly funded by the state’s FilmaJalisco foundation, was “Martínez,” a black comedy about a disgruntled and lonely bureaucrat forced into early retirement, directed by Lorena Padilla.