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 out of fear that supply chains might break, I was receiving banner ads for tactical pants, the full scope of the death and disruption from the pandemic was unclear as we Clorox wiped our Apples... and 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 who in the world might somehow be doing better at a time like this? Who might feel equipped for this level of disconnection and uncertainty? Who may even see this all as an opportunity to build closer relationships with people than ever before?

And so this story began to take shape in my head - of a man who might see our masked world as a way of establishing human connections.

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 in Santiago, and a few of us decided we'd try to make this story into a small movie. I convinced my 1st Assistant Director 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. 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. I hope you enjoy.