Official Latino Film Festival 2019– ¡Viva la Revolución!
After presenting a class project on the Cuban Revolution, a victim of playground bullying starts a revolution to overthrow the autocratic regime, only to become the corrupt dictator himself.
Interview with Director/Producer/Writer Tony Estrada
Imagine I’m a member of the audience. Why should I watch this film?
We made this for kids and their parents. We wanted to ensure that we were bridging the gap between parents and kids so that it would ignite difficult conversations about bullying, whether kids are being bullied or are having a tough time admitting that they are bullying. We offer a high-level message through the lens of a child. At the core of it, is a message of self-empowerment and love for your fellow man no matter how old you are.
How do personal and universal themes work in your film?
From a universal perspective, who hasn't found themselves tired of being pushed around at some point in their life? We all reach a point of 'enough is enough' and I feel, our general human nature looks for us to seek ways to gain power rather than understanding. We translated historical events of the past, i.e. The Cuban Revolution, The French Revolution, The American Revolution, Ganhdi's Independence Movement, The Arab Spring, and Martin Luther King's Civil Rights activism, to seek what it was that has marked the greatest amount of change for the longest period of time. There are markers of each movement hidden within different characters and different parts of the story so that it's digestible for children, and recognizable by adults. It is our goal that taking all these well-known events and seeing them from a child's perspective, makes it accessible to children and adults.
From a personal perspective, when I heard of several of my colleagues' struggles with bullying growing up, this movie became very personal very quickly. I felt a need to serve the story, rather than to have the story serve me. My greatest ambition is to create a culture within my direct circle, and through the film's audience, in which people decide to lead their lives from a place of love. If we can pay that ideal forward, what a marked difference that would make in our world.
How have the script and film evolved over the course of their development?
The initial seed of the idea came as I was traveling back from Cuba -- "What was Che and Castro like as kids?" I thought the idea of a playground revolution was funny. For an idea to "be funny" isn't enough for me, so then it became about, "How do I make this relevant to today?" That's when the idea of bullying came to the forefront. From there, different people I looked to add to this piece in different departments, shared their stories of being bullied. It became a mission of mine to help counteract bullying at its core. R.c. and myself really focused the writing on the most recognizable stories of bullying in human history and let the piece be guided from there.
What type of feedback have you received so far?
We've received fantastic feedback. The most fulfilling has been when we took the film to Sacred Heart School in Covina. Seeing kids raise their fists up during the movie and shouting ¡Viva la Revolución! in elation, showing their connection to the film, just really hit home. Equally important has been that adults have really enjoyed the movie, and so many first reactions we've received from parents has been, "This needs to be shown in schools." I really couldn't ask for more than that.
Has the feedback surprised or challenged your point of view?
Part of the fear going into showing the movie to audiences was how they'd react to some of the darker themes that are in it. My intent was to see how far we could push the envelope without crossing the line, and I've been glad to hear that people felt that we didn't. My perspective most assuredly has shifted in the way that we've looked to distribute this film over a longer period of time. Our primary focus has now shifted to getting this out to schools, along with the film's youth empowerment event to help make as big of an impact on children as we can.
What are you looking to achieve by having your film more visible on www.wearemovingstories.com?
Our biggest goals are to find partnerships with schools, anti-bullying non-profits, children focused festivals, and education-focused distributors.
Who do you need to come on board (producers, sales agents, buyers, distributors, film festival directors, journalists) to amplify this film’s message?
Film Festival Directors, Education Focused Distributors, and Schools.
What type of impact and/or reception would you like this film to have?
My greatest ambition is to shift the conversation on bullying from "how do we fix bullying?" to "how do we empower kids to love themselves so much that they don't project onto others?"
What’s a key question that will help spark a debate or begin a conversation about this film?
What does it mean to be a bully?
Would you like to add anything else?
This has genuinely been one of the greatest experiences of my life. I had such a great time making this movie with all these wonderfully talented kids from Eris Talent Agency, and I cannot wait to see where this continues to go from here. We're actively pursuing partnerships with schools and school districts to get our message out there and help to empower kids everywhere.
What other projects are the key creatives developing or working on now?
My producing partner and I are producing a narrative feature film about a young African American man who falls in love with a Bhutanese refugee, amongst the longstanding tensions between the refugee community and the "native" community in Syracuse. Simultaneously, we'll also be producing a documentary about the greater refugee population in Syracuse, while we're shooting the film. In addition to the other narrative features we have in development, we're also sending a team to Cambodia to do a documentary on the monkey population of Angkor Wat.
Interview: July 2019
We Are Moving Stories embraces new voices in drama, documentary, animation, TV, web series, music video, women's films, LGBTQIA+, POC, First Nations, scifi, supernatural, horror, world cinema. If you have just made a film - we'd love to hear from you. Or if you know a filmmaker - can you recommend us? More info: Carmela
¡Viva la Revolución!
After presenting a class project on the Cuban Revolution, a victim of playground bullying starts a revolution to overthrow the autocratic regime, only to become the corrupt dictator himself.
Length: 19:21
Director: Tony Estrada
Producer: Jona Ward and Tony Estrada
Writer: R.c. Williams and Tony Estrada
About the writer, director and producer:
TONY ESTRADA is a director, producer, and youth empowerment speaker based in Los Angeles, CA. He has produced content for clients including CBS, LA County, Niagara Bottling, Mattel, and Phantom Auto. His short film, Bridesman, starring Danny Trejo, is currently being developed as a feature, alongside several other tv and film projects under his Esquared Entertainment umbrella. His films have screened at festivals internationally, and have earned many awards and recognition including the Santa Barbara Film Festival and the Academy Award Qualifying LA Shortsfest. Tony’s writing has been published in national and international publications, including Elephant Journal, The Advocate and Thought Catalog. ¡Viva la Revolución! will mark Tony’s fourth short film.
RC WILLIAMS had his first stage play, Where There's a Will There's..., published in 2010 by JACneed publishing. He graduated Cum Laude from Brooks Institute with a BA in feature film production in 2009. In 2015 he returned to school in the Screenwriting MFA program at Chapman University where he wrote the short film Radio Silence which premiered at San Diego Comic-Con’s International Film Festival. Rc has served as an advisor and co-writer several short films as well as feature scripts. Currently, he is developing a spec pilot and completing a polish on the feature script of Bridesman.
JONA WARD has produced numerous commercials and narratively-based branded content pieces for clients including HBO’s Insecure, Lyft, Taco Bell, Splenda, Puma, Band-Aid, Microsoft, Verizon, Jameson and the Freeform Network. Most recently, Jona has produced national commercials for Sprint and The National Parks for Roman Coppola’s, The Director’s Bureau. He has produced music videos for artists including Troy Sivane, The 1975, A Tribe Called Quest, Ariana Grande, the Strokes, and Phoenix.
Key cast: Ian Inigo (Dominick), Thaddeus Ek (Riley), Lonnie Chavis (Tim), Miya Cech (Doll), and Maite Perroni (Mrs. Guevara)
Looking for: film festival directors, journalists, sales agents
Facebook: Viva la Revolución
Twitter: @vlrmovie
Instagram: @vlrmovie
Hashtags used: #jointherevolution #playtimeisover
Website: vlrmovie.com
Other: IMDb
Funders: Private Donations
Where can I watch it next and in the coming month? Official Latino Film Festival Semi-Finals/Los Angeles - August 25th