The Platino Awards, Ibero-America’s annual film awards ceremony, has got Madrid buzzing, with industry icon Eva Longoria set to pick up the show’s honorary prize on Sunday night.
The biggest filmmakers from central and southern America, Spain and Portugal have flocked to the Spanish capital for the 12th edition of the event, with nominees including the Academy Award-nominated Fernanda Torres for her performance in Walter Salles’ I’m Still Here and Úrsula Corberó in Luis Ortega’s Kill the Jockey.
Among other nominees are Brazilian actor Gabriel Leone for Netflix‘s F1 series Senna and Spanish legend Pedro Almodóvar for his English-language debut The Room Next Door, which premiered in Venice last year.
The Hollywood Reporter caught up with Ortega on Saturday to talk politics and his next film.
“I don’t like traveling,” the Argentine, nominated for best director with Kill the Jockey, tells THR, admitting that the right-wing Trump administration makes the U.S., in particular Miami, where Ortega grew up, not the most attractive destination right now. “I don’t like police. The airport is terrible, I get strip-searched. It’s terrible, especially if you have my name, which is like a drug trafficker’s name.”
“Our current situation in Argentina is pretty much the same,” he continues, “as in ideology and economy. But [the U.S.] has more money than us, which isn’t necessarily good.” His latest project, Kill the Jockey, debuted to critical acclaim and was Argentina’s entry for best international feature film at this year’s Oscars. While it wasn’t shortlisted, Ortega’s story about two jockeys evading capture by a powerful mobster in Buenos Aires resonated.
The movie did the festival circuit last year, airing in Venice, Toronto and San Sebastian. “You have to drink your way through the festival,” Ortega says on how he found the festival circuit. “It’s unbearable — it has to do very little with the reason why you’re making the film. The whole presentation was pretty exhausting. I like talking with the crowd after the Q&A, but [film festivals] would be better if they were an out-of-body experience. But you have to take your body with you and get on the plane.”
The filmmaker admits the success of Kill the Jockey makes the task of funding his next movie a little easier, though landing the funding isn’t something he enjoys. “The whole getting the money part is boring, right? You have to talk to the enemy,” he says, clarifying that he means people with money. “I don’t have friends with money. Somehow, I get the money because I believe in what I’m doing, but it’s never easy. I don’t care where the money comes from. I grab it and run.”
His newest film, Ortega tells THR, is called Magnetized. It’s about a priest that smokes crack and, while high, gives enamouring speeches. “It doesn’t romanticize crack, obviously,” Ortega says, “But it kind of pumps up his religious side and he falls in love with an actress. He becomes magnetized and goes to work in the mines in the north of Argentina. He finds gold.”
Ortega is finishing off the script. “We’re looking for the money. It’s gonna be a very commercial film,” he says with a smirk.
But there is a hurdle stopping ceremonies like the Platino Awards from getting as big as the Oscars, Ortega continues: “I don’t think anybody gives a fuck,” he says about Spanish-language content making it on the global stage. “People don’t like reading subtitles. I have to know English, but people who know English don’t know how to speak Spanish.”
It’s a problem in his native Argentina, as well, and worldwide, as the dubbing industry becomes increasingly popular. “Spain has their own Pacino [who dubs the actor’s voice for every film he stars in]. When the guy that’s been dubbing Pacino for 50 years dies, then Pacino dies for the Spanish community. Did you know that?”
Hugo Bonemer, a Brazilian actor best known for his theatrical portrayal as fellow countryman Ayrton Senna in the late racer’s onstage biography, is slightly more optimistic about Spanish-language content. “Every human being wants to be valued by their work, recognized for their efforts,” Bonemer says to THR on Saturday. “We want to be loved. We want to be seen.”
Hugo Bonemer as Nelson Piquet in Netflix’s ‘Senna’.
Alan Roskyn/Netflix © 2024
He references filming Netflix’s Senna — shot entirely in South America — which became the streamer’s most-watched non-English language series worldwide after its November release. “In terms of nation, of course, there is this pride, like, yeah, there’s Brazil. We’re making it!”
Bonemer is nominated in the best supporting actor category at the Platino Awards for his performance as Senna‘s rival, Nelson Piquet. “It was like an acid trip. I could feel there was money all around,” he says about being on a Netflix set. “There was a drone on the side of a motorcycle filming us. I had never seen such a thing.”
When asked if he is nervous about Sunday night, the Brazilian replies: “I’m very excited. Anxiety is high level right now!”
