Juan Pablo González
Directing
Biography
A 2024 Guggenheim and MacDowell Fellow, Juan Pablo González is a filmmaker whose work spans fiction and nonfiction. His films are largely based in his hometown of Atotonilco el Alto. Dos Estaciones (2022), Juan Pablo’s feature length debut, received the Special Jury Award for Acting at the Sundance Film Festival and screened at New Directors/New Films (MoMA / Lincoln Center), San Sebastián International Film Festival and Morelia International Film Festival (FICM) where Teresa Sánchez received the Best Acting Award. His mid-length debut, Caballerango premiered at IDFA in 2018 and played at Ambulante, FICUNAM, BAM Cinema Fest, True/False, among many others. In 2020 Juan Pablo had his first solo exhibition titled What I Do To Remember at the Visual Arts Center (VAC) at UT Austin’s Department of Art and Art history. Juan Pablo’s debut short film The Solitude of Memory (2014) had its World Premiere at the Morelia International Film Festival, its International Premiere at IDFA, and received the Grand Jury Prize for Documentary Short at Slamdance in 2015. His follow-up, the scripted La espera (2016), premiered at SXSW and won the Grand Jury Prize at the New Orleans Film Festival. In 2017, Juan Pablo’s short piece, Las Nubes, premiered at the Festival de Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano en la Habana, then went on to play at Rotterdam (IFFR), True/False, Lincoln Center of New York, and received the Grand Jury Prize at Festival dei Popoli. Juan Pablo was awarded the 2022 True Vision Award at the True/False Film Festival that included a program focused on his documentary and fiction work at that year ‘s festival. He was named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film” in 2015, has been a fellow of the Fund for Culture and Arts (FONCA) in Mexico and was awarded the 2021 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise. In 2023 Juan Pablo’s work had a spotlight program at The Center for Fine Arts (BOZAR) in Brussels, Belgium. Currently, Juan Pablo’s entire body of work is being featured on the Criterion Channel.
Known For
Set against the vibrant spectacle of the jaripeo, a symbol of Mexican cowboy tradition and machismo, this story unveils a hidden world of queer desire and quiet rebellion. As glances and gestures disrupt the rigid norms of masculinity, the rodeo becomes a stage for our protagonists to navigate identity, community, and the search for belonging in an oppressively traditional space.
Jaripeo
Fifty-year-old Maria Garcia is the owner of the Dos Estaciones, a once-majestic tequila factory struggling to stay afloat, and the final hold-over from generations of Mexican-owned tequila plants in the highlands of Jalisco; the rest have folded to foreign corporations. Once one of the wealthiest people in town, Maria knows her current financial situation is untenable. When a persistent plague and an unexpected flood cause irreversible damage, she is forced to do everything she can to save her community's main source of economy and pride.
Dos estaciones
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.
Horse Wrangler
A weathered man is partially visible in a rear-view mirror as he relates getting mixed up with the wrong kind.
Las Nubes
A quietist exploration on the way fear shapes the contour of spaces, The Wait portrays at once the straits of immigrant life and the haunting soundscape of reprieve.
La espera (The Wait)
José’s son, Nando, has committed suicide and José repeatedly runs through the final words that he spoke to him.
The Solitude of Memory
Recorded on October 26, 2002 at the Estadio Victor Jara, Santiago, Chile.
Joe Vasconcellos ★ To bad weather, good face
A compelling exploration of the housing crisis in the outskirts of various cities over the past 20 years, capturing the struggles, resilience, and social dynamics of the affected communities.