Jose Luis Rivas

The Cow Who Sang a Song into the Future

A Chilean family is shaken by the sudden return of a long-dead matriarch.

Animales

Harry loves animals. During the day, he works at the Valenzuela brothers’ farm. By night, he becomes an animal thief at the same place. A debt he holds with a corrupt policeman gets him into trouble. Harry becomes the prey.

The Strong Ones

Lucas travels to visit his sister to a remote town in southern Chile. In front of the ocean and the fog, he meets Antonio, a boatswain in a local fishing boat. When an intense romance grows between them, their strength, their independence and their adulthood become immovable in front of the tide.

First Light

Marco, a cynical and ambitious young lawyer, lives in Bari with his partner Martina and their eight-year-old son Mateo. Martina had left Chile and moved to Italy when she met Marco. Their relationship has run its course, however, and Martina longs to go back to her country with Mateo, but Marco, the loving father left out of the equation, is adamantly against the idea. The couple clash for weeks on end, until Martina abruptly leaves the country with their son, goes back to Chile and virtually vanishes. With no news of Mateo, time seems to stand still for Marco. Anguished and unable to cope, he finally rallies and sets off in search of his son.

Voice Over

A married woman — seeking to purify herself through a "disconnection vow" — leaves her husband and returns to her parents’ home, but finds a situation far from the peace and quiet she had imagined.

The Future

When their parents die, Bianca starts to smoke and Tomas is still a virgin. The orphans explore the dangerous streets of adulthood until Bianca finds Maciste, a retired Mr. Universe, and enters his dark mansion in search of a future.

The Band That Met the Sound Beneath

In February, 2010, the renowned Chilean band Panico traveled through the desert of northern Chile to record an album in the Atacama desert. After two decades of punk and post-punk rock, these offspring of political exiles are themselves rocked by not only the strange sounds and voices of the north but by a major earthquake...

Bonsai

A young writer recounts an earlier romance in hopes of attracting his new love interest.

Old Cats

Isidora, an old woman, discovers that her mind is quickly deteriorating. At an apparently relaxed dinner table, she will desperately try to hide her state from her daughter, a demanding woman who awaits any sign of senility in order to take way everything she has.