Mexico
Director:
Alejandra Chacon Gallardo
Screen
writers: Alejandra Chacon Gallardo, Alberto Vázquez Meade, and
Monique Zepeda
Bibliographies:
Certified
Psychoanalyst, certified Lawyer, entrepreneur, Mexican director,
screenwriter, social activist, social project sponsor, and CEO and
cofounder of Respect Under Construction Company that produces
contents for books, short films, streaming series, TV series, and
films.
As
a founding CEO of her company, she has led the designing of their
company purposes and values, the integration of a multicultural
group, and the supervision of all the company’s activities. Before
COVID-19, her company produced a short film that was recognized with
awards in more than twelve festivals worldwide. Their most recent
project is a web page to spread verified information about COVID-19.
This project is the result of national and international alliances in
the public and private sector organizations that has informed
millions of people about mitigating the spread of the pandemic and
the best ways to face its consequences.
Alberto
Vázquez
Mexican
producer, director and screenwriter. He combined his studies in
cinematography with making his first short films in Spain, where he
received various awards in Madrid, Basque Country and Barcelona. He
continued his professional career in Santiago de Chile where he wrote
and directed several fiction T.V. series. In 2008, he received the
Working Progress Award at the Cannes Film Festival for his first
movie "A Blue Giraffe". He is currently founder partner of
Tanke Films, where he produces advertisement content for Mexico and
Spain.
Monique
Zepeda
Writer
of children and teenagers’ books, psychotherapist with a specialty
in children and teenagers. Speaker and workshop conductor on subjects
like child development, promotion of literacy, gender equality, and
prevention of violence. She is a certified trainer for the Finnish
KiVa anti-bullying program, and a certified pedagogue, graduated
from Nacional
Autonomous University of Mexico (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de
Mexico). Additionally, she obtained a General Studies Diploma on
Psychology at Sorbonne University of Paris, France, a master´s
degree in Children Psychology
at the Autonomous University of Morelos State (Universidad Autónoma
del Estado de Morelos), and she is currently studying a literature
master degree
at
the Research Center and Humanity Teaching of Morelos State (Centro de
Investigación y Docencia en Humanidades del Estado de Morelos).
Additionally, she is a social activist in No Human Trafficking
Association (Sin Trata), and also in other NGO´s dedicated to
prevent human trafficking.
1. Your script is entered in our Best Script Award. What is your script about?
It is
a streaming series about 2 misfit kids´ friendship and an
extraordinary character: Kibombo.
One day, Leonardo and
Valentina found a mysterious door; they dare to cross it. Inside the
house, they meet Kibombo, a fantastic character who helps them to
discover the power that lays in questions, and the strength to accept
their fears and desires. With wisdom, and humor and willingness to
move forward, they face bullying, the absence of a parent, and the
ghost of illness within the family.
2.
What are your ambitions with your project?
Our
ambitions with Kibombo jumps in Capital City are to celebrate a
co-investment with a prime streaming company, and contribute with our
plot and our know-how about contents to produce a prime global
fantasy series that promotes empathy, peace and equity through a
captivating non-common and unique children story.
3.
How long have you been writing the script? What was difficult
to write this script?
We
have worked on Kibombo jumps in Capital City for more than 6 years,
and the most important difficulty we faced was to create an
innovative content that would talk about children-reality in a very
natural way, with humor, courage, and heartiness. Our most important
challenge was to build an entertaining product that could stand
parents and children in front of a mirror and allow them to recognize
themselves with love and empathy, no matter what.
4. For what target group is your film?
Our
main target are children from 7-10 years old, but is actually a
family series.
5. Why should distributors buy your
film?
Because
it is a fascinating beloved kids story about friendship, fears, and
courage inside families that face everyday reality, and it is
narrated from a very particular point of view: from the vulnerability
perspective. Our plot shows each character subjectivity and reflect,
in a very particular way, how each person feel empathy and curiosity,
fears and violence, resilience and hope.
6. How would
you specify your work? What characterizes your film?
This
is a story about the others´ point of view, about empathy, and about
curiosity. It is a journey through childhood’s innocence, the
search for adolescence and adulthood’s confusion. The fantastic
discovery of a surreal and hidden house filled with strange encoded
messages will lead Leonardo and Valentina to a magical encounter with
an extraordinary creature called Kibombo, who presents us the value
of making questions about life to understand ourselves and others.
Kibombo jumps in Capital City is a streaming series that was designed
to live in a book –which is already published–, in a streaming
series, or even in an immersion theater, to show us de diversity of
each character.
Our
story gives the possibility to develop different complete seasons
based on the story of each character because the series was designed
to show the value of diversity through different characters. The
season one is totally developed.
7. Why did you decide to become a filmmaker?
Because
we know that creating awareness is a strong tool to find relevant and
massive changes in the world, because we consider that the world
needs to offer new child contents that promotes critical thinking in
an interesting way, and because the planet seems to be on the verge
of re-prioritizing the importance of our problems as new constructs
are being developed with a commitment to peace, equity and global
sustainability. Our compromise is to create new contents that allow
us to be part of the discussion and the solutions, as media content
creators, and as human beings.
8. Who is your greatest
role model?
Sigmund
Freud and Jacques Lacan because they had the ability to discover the
silenced speech of every person, the art of the silence and its
incredible value, and they revealed how our most intimate feelings
are hidden in our words and actions. Lacan and Freud taught us how to
unveil the non-said speech with a unique art: the art of questions.
9. Which movies are your favorites? Why?
The
mission because it shows us the value of the authenticity, empathy,
and peace. The mission develops masterfully the art of having a
purpose in life.
The
Shindler List because it is fully compromised with reality and truth;
this movie express-–without a doubt-– the destruction caused
by ideologies, racism, and hate.
Dead
Poets Society because it shows clearly the beauty of friendship, the
magnitude of freedom, and the enormous difficulties to respect
diversity.
10. Where do you look for inspiration for
your films?
We
look for inspiration in our personal experience, in real life, and in
any kind of content namely books, movies, TV series, or theater
plays. We try to find expressions of beauty and pain, of the evident
and non-evident truth, of diversity and uniqueness; we look for the
metaphor in any phrase, action or human creation.
11. Which topics interest you the most?
The
endless search of a reason in life, the beauty, the human pain, the
path of resilience, and the different ways to build dignity in
life.
12. What do you consider your greatest
achievement?
Monique
Zepeda
As an
author of children books, some of her greatest achievement are that
she had published more that 30 books, she had been selected for the
White Raven award in Bologna book fair with two titles, and that she
had written a text book for the Mexican Ministry of education which
was printed in 11 million copies.
Alejandra Chacon
Her
greatest achievements amongst others is to serve as counselor for the
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), creating
refugee settlements, and had given advice about international
agreements with respect to human rights. Other great achievements
were working for the Pacification Agreement Commission in Chiapas
State (Comisión para la Concordia y Pacificación en Chiapas),
finding solutions to protect Mexican First Nations’ human rights
and their ways of life, and have founded a production company that
creates contents to spread awareness about empathy, peace, and
equity.
Alberto Vázquez
Finding
my true passion at a very young age has given me the chance to make
my wildest dream come to life; to travel around the world doing what
I’m most passionate about…film making. Each project has rewarded
me with a great variety of satisfactions and experiences.
Collaborating with people around the world has given me invaluable
learning opportunities that make me feel constantly thankful. The
gift of spending the last years of my mom’s life by her side, and
becoming a parent have taught me to live in the here and now and to
understand that all we have is the moment. Bringing every project to
an end has brought to me a new opportunity to continue with the same
illusion and commitment as in the beginning of my professional
journey; and this is my greatest achievement.
13. What do you consider most important about filming?
Any
film needs a story to tell. In our opinion, quality rest mainly on
it. All productions have a responsibility with society even though
not everybody know it: we have to generate awareness, social
activism, and change makers in our critical world moments.
14.
How would you divide your script into parts? (exposure, collision, 3
act ..)
The
script is divided in 12 episodes forming an arc. In this arc, we can
find 3 different parts: the first one guide the viewer to meet the
characters and their circumstances; the second part is about Kibombo
discovery and his magical traits, and the third part is about the
effect that Kibombo has on the lives of each character and how they
choose to solve their problems.
Kibombo
is a journey through authenticity, acceptance, imagination and
fantasy. It is almost a graphic representation of the complexity of
human mind. The development of the episodes will have, besides the
progression of a central dramatic arch, an individual argument with a
unique treatment, nurtured by its characters and situations. The
rhythm of these short but exquisite stories with a beginning, middle
and ending provides the spectator with a dose of comedy and awe in
each and every chapter with the purpose of captivating the audience.
CHAPTER
1
During
the first act of our first episode, we provide a fair understanding
of the Universe of Capital City and its inhabitants. Something
strange has occurred during bedtime. A weird type of luminous comet
has descended in a dark alley. Valentina and Leonardo, two kids who
live in the same neighborhood have witnessed what happened. Both kids
attend the same school at different grade levels and have never
spoken to each other. Valentina has a reckless and fearless
personality, however she is harshly criticized and singled out at
school for her strange way of mixing up words, as a consequence of
dyslexia. Leonardo is a sharp minded child with hunger for knowledge,
shy and poorly talented at sports who is victim of bullies at school.
During
the second act, we present the problems that our main character’s
face at home. Valentina's mother suddenly started complaining of a
strong pain and had to be urgently hospitalized. Valentina does not
understand what is wrong with her mom and does not get any
explanation from her sisters or father. Silence unleashes a terrible
anguish and she decides to take refuge at the park. Leonardo asks his
mother if his dad will ever come back; he’s been away from home for
quite a while and Leonardo has not received any news: “Things
weren't going well and maybe it was all my fault”, Leonardo
thought. A need to overcome his fears takes him to the park behind
his building. There is a magical encounter: Valentina and Leonardo
meet. They are so strangely different… But there is something that
instantly bonds them. They have both witnessed the strange events of
the night before and are determined to find answers.
During
the third act, a pact is consolidated. Valentina and Leonardo are
willing to enter the dark alley, they decided to spend some time
every day trying to find the clues that will lead them to reveal the
hidden mystery. Many adjustments have been made in Valentina's home
to try to replace the presence of her mother. There is an environment
of uncertainty that grows with each passing minute. Leonardo
confesses to his mother, that he feels guilty for his father's
abandonment. There are no words that can heal his heart. That night,
lightings and colorful flashes of light in the sky return. The
mysterious alley is flooded with a strange electricity; one of the
walls begins to transform and creating a small door. In the
reflection of a small puddle, we’ve managed to see its true
appearance for an instant: It is an orange and yellow strange
character. The image is distorted and the strange character
disappears quickly through the dark alley.
15. How would you rate current filmmaking?
There
are a lot of masterpiece productions that inspire us in uncountable
ways, but we, as content creators, are on debt with our society;
violence is the Queen of a big percentage of the entertainment
industry in a Century where peace, creativity, and resilience are
crucial elements to succeed and save the planet.
16.
What can make you angry in a movie?
That
it does not share a responsible point of view about life, namely just
showing ideas or violence without a reason and without any pain
explanation related to it.
17. Who supports you in
your film career?
Alejandra
Chacon
During
her film career, she has been accompanied by her husband, daughters,
and family. To find partners for developing her content company has
been an incredible journey that gave her the opportunity to build
beloved relationships with Ramón Amezcua –her husband-, Monique
Zepeda, Javier Macías, Ana Laura Delgado, among others.
Monique
Zepeda
Respect
Under Construction is a company interested in generating innovative
contents for kids and their families, and for this project this
company has supported her to write Kibombo´s book.
Alberto
Vazquez
My
passion for film making flourished thanks to my relationship with my
father. Every weekend, we went to the movies together until it became
a ritual to have deep discussions about every movie we saw. We shared
opinions on the actors, director, script, etc. I always had the
support of my parents and sister to pursue my dream. Along the way,
I’ve had the great fortune of meeting people that have boosted my
career by giving me the chance to work with amazing teams in
different countries.
18. What are the reactions of your surroundings to your screen
play?
When
people read the screen play, they love the friendship story, they
really appreciate that it talks about real life in a very honest and
simple way, they recognize the unique deep character development, and
they recognize that the story talks about incredible dear characters.
Additionally,
people remark the resource of being part of each character
experience: they recognize that being on character shoes is a great
way to understand other persons. Moreover, people love the strength
of Valentina, the naivety of Kibombo, and more than one have
recognized themselves in Leonardo´s story, who has the ability to
show our daily vulnerability.
Moreover, people recognize
that our story revels truths for everybody–parents and children–,
that our story has a structure that justify every word, every action
and every decision, and that our story has a meaningful core careful
knitted to each situation and each character.
Finally,
people find a very different story that do not have any similar
precedent, because of the characters, because of the story, because
of the deep content.
19.
Have you already visited any of the prestigious film festivals?
Yes,
our screenplay was Official Selection of the WorldFest-Houston
Festival 2021 and obtained a Sliver Remi. Furthermore, our project
has been included as Best Film Awards Official Selection.
20.
What are your next projects?
We
will work on Kibombo jumps in Capital City to make it a global
streaming series that would move people to work on social projects in
a world that imperiously needs to be saved.
Also,
we are working on a film that analyzes personal responsibility in
climate change, pandemics and inequity. We would like to produce an
incredible film that would move worldwide people to save our planet.
SOCIAL
MEDIA
YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5vc36ThheM4
Instagram:
https://instagram.com/kibombopregunta?igshid=z4m3v0lfmqlh
Facebook:
@KibomboPregunta / https://fb.watch/5pCBz4757v/
Webpage: https://www.ruc.mx/ruc-projects