Director’s Statement
Cafe Cicatriz is a story I developed during the pandemic's darkest days of uncertainty and despair.
My daughter was 2 years old, there was widespread civil unrest in our city, the President was teargassing kids at a church, I had a Google Sheets for our home rations in case supply chains break, and my banner ads were targeted with promos for tactical pants. The full scope of the death and disruption from the pandemic was unclear as we Clorox wiped our Apples... and in the back of my mind, I worried that my utility as a storyteller wouldn't be highly valued in our return to a hunter-gatherer society.
Against that backdrop, I wondered if anyone out there in the world was actually okay.
Who might feel equipped for this level of disconnection and uncertainty? Could anyone see this time as an opportunity to actually grow deeper human relationships ? And so this story began to take shape in my head - of a man who might see our masked world as a moment for courage and connection.
I wouldn't shoot the film for two more years, until I found myself in Santiago, Chile directing a commercial. I met an amazing community of filmmakers there, and a few of us decided we'd try to make this story into a small movie.
I convinced my 1st AD from the commercial that he could play our lead. Max Morales, 1st AD, became our Max in Cafe Cicatriz - in what is his first acting performance. His real-life girlfriend, Lourdes Ramirez, became our Lourdes (as well as our production designer and wardrobe department).
It was an extremely intimate, handmade film that helped me exorcise some of the residual despair of those early pandemic days.
Together, we tried to make something that feels totally human - that treats 'the other' as a fully emotional person and maybe inspires a laugh or a wince.
