The Houston Latino Film Festival is an event that brings awareness to Latino creatives that focus their culture. They feature films in our area and I thought it would be great to introduce this to my son. The Film festival was held at the Midtown Arts & Theatre Center Houston (MATCH) on March 15-19. Every day is a lineup of different films, actors, writers, and includes various film directors in attendance on the day of their film showing. My son jumped online to check out the films each day and he decided on Sunday the 19th as the day he wanted to attend.
We made our way to Midtown and found a parking space across the street in the parking garage. We went to look around because this was our first visit to Midtown Art & Theatre Center Houston. We noticed a room with piñata cameras, and that drew us in.
A lady was sitting at a table and we asked to purchase some tickets for the short films Program 9 – Sunday Cinema showing.
We looked around and there were a lot of flyers and information on the walls about an artist.
We ended up taking a few pictures and left to find where the short films would be showing. As we passed by the concession stand, Diego mentions he is hungry. I tell him it’s just snack food and to hold off for some real food.
We find the theater and have a seat. By now we are thirty minutes early and sitting in the empty theatre. Diego says, “ Hey Mom I’m starting to get hungry. Do you think we can walk over to the pizza place I noticed when we were looking for parking?”
Honestly, pizza was starting to sound good. So I figured why not let’s go! He looks it up and it’s within walking distance, just down the block. We head over to Home Slice Pizza and enjoy a quick slice.
We made it back and by this time there were a lot more people in the theater. We show our tickets and go sit down. The short films we watched were,
-Charro & Steed (A Story of Mexican Rodeo)
-I Have No Tears, and I Must Cry
-Georgia
-TÍO claymation film
-Mapimí
My son picked this particular short film program because it included a claymation film. He is currently learning about animation in school. I was looking forward to the discussion with the directors of one of the films. It turns out the film directors and production staff for the film Mapimí were sitting right behind us. A presenter introduced them and they spoke about the film.
Afterwards, they had a question and answer session. Diego was eager to meet them and before we left he went to talk to them some more.
Diego was inspired and motivated to pursue film in college. It was neat to see so much talent displayed and that we are fortunate to live in a city to be exposed to creative minds.
If you want to see unique films in the Houston area, be on the lookout for the Houston Latino Film Festival.