TIJUANA MAKES ME HAPPY - ProfilesArchive

About Me

Every man remembers how hard it is being 14 years old: Your voice is cracking, your hormones are raging, school is boring, the girl you love is a young prostitute who won't go out with you because you don't have enough cash, so you start smuggling drugs across the border in order to save enough money to buy a rooster so you can enter a cockfight and win her love. It's a tale as old as time itself.
Tijuana Makes Me Happy, which won the Grand Jury Prize at this year's Slamdance Film Festival, is both a charming coming-of-age story and a celebration of the most infamous of all Mexican border towns. It's also a subtle criticism of society's lust for money and success and the lengths to which people will go to attain both. For the film's hero, Indio (Ortiz), the city's red-light district is a siren's song of erotic mystery. While just across the border - the "other side," as Tijuanans call it - lies a world of boundless economic possibility. In the middle resides Indio's loyalty to his underemployed but decent father, Jhonny (Rocha). Which to choose? Which to choose?
Tijuana Makes Me Happy

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Cada hombre se recuerda como es tan difÃcil de tener 14 aÃ±os: Tu voz se acaba, tus hormonas estÃ¡n locas, la escuela te molesta, la muchacha que te gusta es una jovencita que trabaja en le Coahuila y ella no quiere salir contigo porque no tienes suficiente de dinero, asÃ empiezas a cruzar la frontera con marihuana para poder ganar bastante de dinero y comprar un gallo de pelea para pelearlo y ganar su amor. Es un cuento tan viejo que el mundo.
Tijuana Makes Me Happy gaÃ±o el premio del Grande Juicio al festival famoso de cinema independiente de Slamdance en Park City Utah, por Mejora PelÃcula Narrativa de este aÃ±o 2007, y el premio Indie Max al festival de San Antonio. Esta pelÃcula es al mismo tiempo una historia de la niÃ±ez y la celebraciÃ³n de la ciudad de Tijuana. Pero al mismo tiempo es un critico sutil de la sociedad capitalista y de su lujo por dinero, del suceso y de lo que la gente hace para obtenerlo. Por el protagonista de la pelÃ, Indio (Pablo Tendilla Ortiz), la Coahuila es como una canciÃ³n de misterio erÃ³tica de una sirena. Mientras que al otro lado, en los Estados Unidos, tiene un mundo de posibilidades econÃ³micas que parecen sin limites. En la mitad, hay el padre fiel de Indio, que si no tiene trabajo es un hombre honrado, Jhonny (Pablo Tendilla Rocha). Â¿Que conseguir, que conseguir?...
TIJUANA MAKES ME HAPPY MUSIC VIDEO
A young man will go to any lengths to make his dream come true in this independent drama from writer and director Dylan Verrechia. Indio (Pablo Tendilla Ortiz) is growing up with a poor family in the Mexican border town of Tijuana. Cockfighting is still a popular and lucrative sport in Tijuana, and Indio thinks he has what it takes to train a champion bird. As a present for his fifteenth birthday, Indio asks his father Jhonny (Pablo Tendilla Rocha) to get him a rooster that's up for sale from a local breeder who has helped spawn some winning birds. However, Jhonny can't afford the rooster, and instead buys his son an evening with Brianda (Darina Rabago Soto), a teenage prostitute. While Indio and Brianda strike up a brief romance, he's not about to give up his ambitions of training a winning rooster, and takes whatever odd jobs he can find to help raise the cash -- everything from washing cars to working as a drug mule. Tijuana Makes Me Happy received its premiere at the 2007 Slamdance Film Festival, where it received the Jury Prize for Best Dramatic Feature.
~ Mark Deming, The New York Times
http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/343816/Tijuana-Makes-Me-Happ y/overview

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 21/11/2005
Band Website: www.tijuanamakesmehappy.com
Band Members: EQUIPO TÃ‰CNICO:
Director, Guionista, Productor: Dylan Verrechia
Productor, Guionista, Camara, Montaje: James Lefkowitz
Coproductor: Pablo Tendilla Rocha
Nortec Collective: Pepe Mogt
Casting: Aidee Gonzalez
Sonido: Leonardo Costa-Gomes y Julio Molina
Maquillaje: Lupita Tendilla Ortiz

ACTORES:
Indio: Pablo Tendilla Ortiz
Jhonny: Pablo Tendilla Rocha
Rebecca: Aidee Gonzalez
Brianda: Darina Rabago Soto
Sacramento: Jorge HernÃ¡ndez
Luis: Luis Carmona Arochi
Pescado: Ivan Equihua Carlos
Marcos: Marco Carmona Arochi
Ruli: Raul Rodriguez Rodriguez
Fidel: Alejandro Ramirez Achutegui
Tocallo: Pablo Jimenez Rivera
Mitch: Mitchell Harris
La Abuela: Augustina Ocampo Lopez
Chollo: Javier Lopez
Efrain: Efrain Serrano

MÃšSICA: Nortec Collective, Lila Downs y Soxiedad Anonima.

Influences: Many influences from the neo-realism films of De Sica, like "Umberto D", to Pasolini's "Accatone", Orson Welles's "It's All True", Eisenstein's "Â¡Que Viva Mexico!", BuÃ±uel's "Los Olvidados", Satyajit Ray's "Pather Panchali", Kusturica's "When Father Was Away on Business", Jarmusch's "Down by Law", Dardenne's "La promesse" and to the music of Manu Chao's "Casa Babylon" and "Clandestino", Lila Downs' "La Linea", and Nortec Collective's "Tijuana Makes Me Happy".

GRAND JURY PRIZE FOR BEST NARRATIVE FEATURE AT THE 2007 SLAMDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
WINNER OF THE 2007 SAFILM INDIE MAX AWARD

For more info: www.tijuanamakesmehappy.com
For more info: www.dylanverrechia.com

FESTIVALS & SCREENINGS:
* Roxie Theater, San Francisco, Aug 17th, 2008
* El Festivalito, Guatemala, Jun 28th, 2008
* Indie 2007 SÃ£o Paulo, Brazil, Nov 29th - Dec 6th, 2007
* NewFilmmakers at Anthology Film Archives, New York, NY, Nov 14th, 2007
* Lone Star International Film Festival, Fort Worth, TX, Nov 7th - 11th, 2007
* Festival Cultural de la Ciudad de Tijuana, MÃ©xico, Oct 30th - Nov 3rd, 2007
* Indie World Film Festival, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, Oct 5th - 11th, 2007
* Festival de Cine de Bogota, Colombia, Oct 3rd - 11th, 2007
* Oldenburg International Film Festival, Germany, Sep 12th - 16th, 2007
* Temecula Valley Int'l Film and Music Festival, CA, Sep 12th - 16th, 2007
* True West Cinema Festival, Boise, ID, Aug 9th -12th, 2007
* San Antonio Underground Film Festival, TX, Jun 22nd - 24th, 2007 WINNER
* Blue Mountain Film Festival, Ontario, Canada, Jun 1st - 3rd, 2007
* DiBa Film Festival, Barcelona, Spain, May 17th - 27th, 2007
* Arizona International Film Festival, Tucson, AZ, Apr 20th - 29th, 2007
* Atlanta Film Festival, Atlanta, GA, Apr 19th - 28th, 2007
* Poland Film Festival, Cracow, Poland, Apr 19th-22nd, 2007
* Cine Las Americas, Austin, TX, Apr 16th - 26th, 2007
* IFC Center, New York, NY, Feb 13th, 2007
* Slamdance Film Festival, Park City, UT, Janu 18th - 27th, 2007 WINNER
* XXI Cine Latino de Trieste, Italy, Oct 24th - 29th, 2006
* Baja California Film Festival, CECUT, Tijuana, Mexico, Sep 19th - 24th, 2006
* Museum of Contemporary Art of San Diego, San Diego, CA, Jun 15th, 2006
* Cine Mexico Film Festival, The Loft Cinema, Tucson, AZ, Feb 18th, 2006
* Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival, CA, Oct 21st - 30th, 2005
* Cannes Film Market, France, May 12th - 15th 2005

In an era of reality television shows that feel even more scripted and formulaic than the latest Hollywood romantic comedy, it is easy to be cynical about the capacity of today's film and television industries for genuine storytelling. More often than not when the lights come up, we in the audience are left with the feeling that if art reflects life, then our particular existence is some off-kilter cross between the melodramatic and the ridiculous, with all the depth of Norbit and the pathos of American Idol.

I was rejuvenated when I left the IFC Center in New York City after seeing Tijuana Makes Me Happy, directed by Dylan Verrechia and produced by James Lefkowitz, which won the Grand Jury prize for Best Narrative Feature at Slamdance in Park City this year. A coming-of-age story about a young boy growing to manhood in Playas de Tijuana, Verrechia and Lefkowitz's film is an invigorating fusion of fiction and reality that rises to the challenge of powerful storytelling and fun, innovative film-making.

Tijuana Makes Me Happy is all the more compelling because the actors in the film are actual Tijuana residents essentially playing themselves. Jhonny and Indio are played by father/son duo Pablo Tendilla Rocha and Pablo Tendilla Ortiz. In real life, Pablo and Pablito live with the rest of their family--a mother and two sisters--but they do a marvelous job channeling the friction and co-dependence of a father and son alone together in the world, trying to negotiate each other's needs and expectations. In fact, there are no professional actors in the cast, and the scenes are refreshingly authentic as a result.

With subdued pacing and un-staged shots of the Tijuana red-light district at night, the morning ceremony at a local school, the ever-expanding development of bright pink houses where the families live, and the local slums, the film has a documentary sensibility that is enlivened by the carefully constructed story the characters live out.

What it lacks in sharpness, Tijuana Makes Me Happy more than makes up for in sincerity and pizazz. The title song will be stuck in your head for weeks, and the poignancy of Indio's adolescent struggle and redemption never fades. That Verrechia and Lefkowitz have succeeded in creating a universally appealing Tijuana-based tale at a time when the American government and countless citizens regularly denounce people from south of the border is an accomplishment and a contribution.

Rebecca Wiegand, IndieIN

official website: www.tijuanamakesmehappy.com "... a great film, neo realism a la Tito of Rosselini, a very hard thing to do, every twenty years maybe somebody pulls it off. Plus the non judgmentalism of it all, a great piece of art..."
Eitan Gorlin, director of The Holy Land

"... Pablo Tendilla Ortiz is an engaging screen presence as Indio, the pic's young protagonist..."
Joe Leydon, Variety

Sounds Like: Like no other.

A boy will do anything to become a man and win the heart of a young prostitute... even fight his rooster.

Record Label: 25th Frame and Palenque Filmaciones
Type of Label: Indie

My Blog

The Making of

Tijuana Makes Me HappyHecho en Tijuana, Mexico, 79', Color Synopsis in EnglishIndio is a fourteen-year-old-boy who lives in Playas de Tijuana. Every day after school, Indio works at Sacramentos ranch ...
Posted by on Tue, 04 Apr 2006 16:10:00 GMT

Music Video: 1st of Nortec Collective

After the motion picture... Now Nortec Collective, Palenque Filmaciones and 25th Frame are proud to announce the major independent music video hecho en Tijuana for Pepe Mogt's "Tijuana Makes Me Happy"...
Posted by on Wed, 15 Feb 2006 07:58:00 GMT

www.tijuanamakesmehappy.com

Welcome to the "Tijuana Makes Me Happy" film site!Welcome! This is a central resource for folks interested in the indie film "Tijuana Makes Me Happy" by director Dylan Verrechia and producer James Lef...
Posted by on Mon, 09 Jan 2006 14:23:00 GMT