Movies (with a side of Guillermo Del Toro).

Movies, since I can remember, have been a crucial part of my life.

Every Sunday growing up, my family and I would go jogging, eat ice cream afterwards and go watch a movie. Any movie, all the movies... good and bad, commercial or artsy, we would buy truckloads of popcorn and watch them all.

As soon as I could, I began to skip classes to go on my own to the theater and submerge myself in a world beyond my dreams. I would pay with my pocket money and through the screen travel the world and live lives I never imagined I would.

I was lucky enough to live near the best art house theater in Mexico City, the Cineteca Nacional, where you could see fabulous old and new movies from around the world for very cheap.

The Cineteca hosted (and still does) a once a year marathon of cutting edge movies from all over the world. They sold a passport, with a discount for students, to see them all. They showed a different movie every day for a whole month. Half way through the Muestra (as the marathon is called) I was so exhausted  that all movies I had watched had melted into one single memory/trip that involved young/old rich/poor people from Ukrania/el Salvador/Outer space/Japan going on a quest to obtain wisdom/the treasure/ransom/peace/revenge through all sorts of adventures. I saw many of my favorite movies there, way before some of them became popular icons.

I saw such an abundance of movies that by when I was in college I felt like I had seen all the movies under the sun. Sometimes I rent a movie only to find out at the third scene or so I had already seen it but did not remember!

It has been fun to revisit some of my favorites with J, specially the scary ones. I know he loves me so, because he watches them even though they give him nightmares.

One of my favorite artists/directors of all times is Guillermo Del Toro (whom I recently met at a book signing, yay!), the most talented monster creator of our times, if you ask me. The New Yorker magazine had a feature on him recently and they made a short video to go along with that.

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

R

 Video from The New Yorker Magazine