There is a long list of films that were turned down by one major film festival only to have a breakout moment at another. For example, Richard Linklater’s “Boyhood” ended up going to Sundance after Cannes passed and Lena Dunham’s “Tiny Furniture” went to SXSW after Sundance passed. Fast forward to 2021 and Mexico’s submission for the International Film Oscar, Fernando Frias de la Parra‘s “I’m No Longer Here” (“Ya no Estoy aquí”), has overcome an even less prestigious rollout. It debuted at the Morelia International Film Festival with little fanfare but earned rave reviews with it launched on Netflix last June. No disrespect to Morelia, but most nominees premiered or at least screened at Venice, Cannes, Berlin, TIFF, or other major festivals.
In the year and a half since, director and writer Fernando Frías de la Parra has been so overjoyed by the film’s reception that he developed a somewhat shrewd perspective on the situation.
“Maybe for one, there was a film already about dancing or maybe the Latin American film of that year or maybe the film of Mexico that year [was chosen instead],” Frias de la Parra says. “I respect that and I am a fan of film festivals. I worked covering film festivals at a very young age and that was very formative to me being able to sit down with a director that I admired, but also going beyond this question, Gregory, I think your question can expand to something bigger and it’s what we expect to be or how we fit into the narratives that are expected from different places. So, if we are to talk about the violence and drug war in Mexico, are we supposed to do it in such a way that it’s just only about that and it’s very in your face and it’s very much only about that? Or is there a way of framing personal films set in that world to maybe show the impact of these life circumstances through other colors? I always have thought that film is not only about telling the story but also about showing different angles to the world and its phenomena. And there has been a correlation between different places of the world making a product out of the life in those places and how the product is welcomed abroad very far away. And then that, as well, has an impact on the kind of content or kind of films that are expected to come out from those places.”
Initially set in a lower-income neighborhood of Monterrey circa 2011, “I’m No Longer Here” follows Ulises (Juan Daniel Garcia Treviño), the leader of a teenage gang known as Los Terkos. They are a group of kids that have their own unique style and are obsessed with slowed-down Cumbia music which they refer to as “Cumbia Rebajada.” When Ulises finds himself unintentionally in the crossfire of a gang shooting, his family sends him to America for safety. When he arrives in New York City he struggles to adjust and provide for himself.
Frias de la Parra jumped on a zoom call last month to discuss the film’s almost decade-long journey to completion, the connection between his work on the HBO comedy series “Los Espookeys” and “I’m No Longer Here” and much more.
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The Playlist: “I’m No Longer Here” debuted at a film festival in 2019, almost a year and a half ago. How are you feeling considering people are still seeing discovering it thanks to award season?
Fernando Frias: Overjoyed, surprised, tired, extremely thankful of course, all of the above. It’s been a long journey and not only for the release but in order to release the film or to premiere it. Certainly, the film premiered in Morelia in October 2019. But then what is that nowadays with the pandemic? Everything feels really crazy and, on top of that, for me, this is the first time experiencing something like this. And Greg, the only thing that I learned is that there’s nothing to be expected and that it’s incredible that we don’t control results. We control processes and it’s great. That’s what we’re going to remember, but the story of this film keeps writing itself day by day. And, as you said, I’m surprised, to begin with, but I am thankful. There was a tiny little sparkle inside me that knew that we were doing this with, to me, a fresh and honest and careful approach to our characters and to their world. And I felt that this film could connect with the people because it was a very long process for the research and I feel like I was taking all of that into consideration. If you go on Instagram and see the fan art or the people feeling represented are rooting for the film right now, that is for me, the biggest, biggest, biggest takeout. And that gives me the strength to carry on with the interviews and with everything because people are responding. When I go back on Twitter or when I go into my Instagram direct messages, I have messages from kids that are rooting for the film as if it was a sports event.
Your film has been lauded by Guillermo del Toro and Alfonso Cuarón and was eventually chosen as Mexico’s Oscar submission. You’ve made the shortlist, but the film did not debut at a major, huge film festival although I’m going to guess you submitted to a bunch of them. Are there any film festivals now that are probably like, “F**k, we should have accepted it. We made a mistake.” I’m not asking you to call them out, but did that happen at all or did you always want to go to the festival that you premiered at to premiere it at?
I am not sure if there’s a festival saying like, “Oh, we should have,” but I hope there is. I am almost pretty sure from what I’ve heard… But listen, I respect film festivals a lot. And sometimes there’s…
Politics?
There’s not one particular situation repeating itself over and over. Maybe for one, there was a film already about dancing or maybe the Latin American film of that year or maybe the film of Mexico that year [was chosen instead]. So I respect that and I am a fan of film festivals. I worked covering film festivals at a very young age and that was very formative to me being able to sit down with a director that I admired, but also going beyond this question, Gregory, I think your question can expand to something bigger and it’s what we expect to be or how we fit into the narratives that are expected from different places. So if we are to talk about the violence and drug war in Mexico, are we supposed to do it in such a way that it’s just only about that and it’s very in your face and it’s very much only about that? Or is there a way of framing personal films set in that world to maybe show the impact of these life circumstances through other colors? I always have thought that film is not only about telling the story but also about showing different angles to the world and its phenomena. And there has been a correlation between different places of the world making a product out of the life in those places and how the product is welcomed abroad very far away. And then that, as well, has an impact on the kind of content or kind of films that are expected to come out from those places. So right now where I’m standing, talking to you, I feel super happy and I feel that even though maybe we didn’t have a glorious premiere at a huge film festival, I think that the story of our film, it’s something that it’s defining conventions up until this very moment and I like that. I like that because I think it contributes to a bigger question.
It is a rare journey for a film to get where you started to the Oscar shortlist, which is why I asked. And by the way, I’ve seen many films over the years that I’m like, “I can’t believe Sundance turn this down” or “I can’t believe TIFF or Cannes…” But it all worked out in the end. Let’s go back to the beginning though. Where did the inspiration for this story come from?
In the beginning, it sounded like it would be a different film. I had different interests. From myself, living in New York, coming here for something that was supposed to be an incredible opportunity and experience and doubting myself at some point about that, so I was writing something more personal in that way. Then, I was very much inspired by what I told you about already, about what not to do. I knew what my country and the whole region were going through, but particularly the border around those years, 2010, 2011, and I saw how there were narratives that were talking about these issues and I was questioning the way they were doing that. So, I was inspired by saying, “Is there another way to touch upon this without just making it about this? And about showing the impact of these circumstances but not only betting on shock and commotion but actually, putting together a puzzle in which the centerpiece is the inner life of a character and the loss of youth of course? Then I had the music that was essential and this was the first stepping stone for this whole project because I got this CD with MP3s of the Cumbias Rebajadas from many years ago and I love it. I’ve always, for one reason or the other, put everything in my workaround cultural clashes or glitches or syncretisms. Those are the things that I am very interested in because they are harder to be calculated or to predict, but they just happen spontaneously and there’s so much to learn about these cultural accidents if you want to call them that, And then after I started, I was paying back a scholarship that I had and I decided to teach some workshops. And I remember being in a town very close to where the film is set and one of the kids asked me how old I was then. I was in my very early thirties then and I told him so, and he said, “Oh, I’m going to be dead by your age.” And he was completely aware. He had already made his mind. He wanted to experience life at its fullest even if that implies dying young. And I sat down and talked to him and his friends for a while. And of course, I cannot judge his decision. I can understand this. What are the opportunities in this place? What the upward social mobility in places like this? There’s none. There are no opportunities. They are making plans for their lives in like they want to experience things that they know are there and they’ll find a way around it. And that made me wonder how much people uninformed, they judge other people that work outside of the law and stuff like that, precisely in Mexico with all the classism and racism. As I saw these dance movements and I felt that this slowed-down cumbia is like a metaphor for not wanting the music to stop for us. It’s not wanting just to expire because there’s nothing after it, so I want to just keep dancing. I want to keep holding onto this moment because after that, there’s nothing. And that was the essence of the film. And also I was doing a lot of research on gangs from a sociological anthropological standpoint from Central America to the Northern border of Mexico with the US, and at some point, virtually all of this interest become one. One started to mesh with the other and then the other and then the other and then just the film became what it is.
How many years did you work on the project overall?
I started writing it in university in my second year as my thesis script. This is 2012, but it just started changing so much. I went to the Sundance lab in 2014 with the script, but in between, I was going so much back and forth to Monterey and staying there. I also worked there in 2011 before writing and that’s where I had the experience that I just told you about with the kids. And then I kept writing 2015 up until…I think we secured the first government fund in Mexico at the end of 2016, but I just kept writing, finding kids to talk to. For example, the structure of two parallel times, the structure of the film, was something that came up in the summer of 2015, but I just kept writing all the time and doing a lot of research. There were a lot of very useful documents or a lot of very helpful people because this is something that is when I started doing the research, I saw it fading out. It was precisely what we were narrating [in the] film that this new cartel came and they swept life on the streets. This particular war between two cartels and then with the government replacing police with the army. And so this meant the ending of this counter-cultural movement to a certain extent [in Monterey]. So it was very hard for me to keep researching it as it was getting swept from there.
Why did you persevere on this particular story?
It was just the one that I wanted to tell. I didn’t want to do anything else and I felt connected to it. Then at some point, later on, I felt that I was the ultimate terco. Terco is [Spanish for] “stubborn,” you know?
Yeah.
But also I felt, as I started working with people and the kids, and I felt like I owe it to them. So at different stages, there were different things giving me strength. For example, going to the Sundance lab or minding a kid who just is showing me all of these things in Monterey or discovering that this is structure will help me not be so didactic and carry the emotion in the foreground and the rationale logic information one step behind, so that you feel the film a little bit before you understand it and then it all comes together in the end. Or how people in Mexico, friends of mine, were responding to the script to some scenes that I had, that gave me the strength to keep going.
Well, that’s sort of amazing. Your story for this film is a great story for anyone coming out of film school, who just works a couple of years and they get upset that they can’t get a movie made because you just have to keep fighting. While all this was going on you also directed episodes of the first season of HBO’s “Los Espookys.” I spoke to those guys when they were doing some Emmy press a year ago. They had gone to Chile to shoot season two and then the pandemic shut that down. Are you doing any episodes for season two or are you not involved?
No, I’m not involved, but I did all of the first season. I love them. I think it’s an incredible project. I’m very thankful. And I think Julio is wonderful, Fred is wonderful, and the producers too. I just made such great friends and they’ve been super supportive. And I’ll tell you this very quick, so if you look at us “Los Espookys” in the first season, there’s an episode in which Renaldo and his friends cannot get a visa to go to work on a film in the US and they need the help of the ambassador. And they wrote that because that was happening to me because Juan Daniel after we shot in Monterey, couldn’t come to New York to finish the other part of the film because even though his visa was approved, every time he went to the interview, he got rejected. That’s how close we were and how one thing inspired the other. That’s what was happening and sometimes I was scouting with them and I was very stressed because, at that time, when Daniel was having another interview in an embassy, and if he blew that one, he would have to wait 10 years before applying for a new one and we have already shot half of the film. So “Los Espookys” and “Ya no estoy aquí” were intertwined very much.
Have you had time to work on anything else over the past year? Do you have another feature in the works?
Yes, even before I’m finishing this film, I read a book and I loved it and I was lucky enough to get the rights. It’s a dark comedy, but with a strong point of view about the world being a melting pot. It’s about a Mexican couple set in Barcelona. That’s what I’m looking forward to doing next. I have other projects. I’ve been doing television and because of “Ya no Estoy aquí,” I’ve been receiving a big amount of people’s stories and there’s one that it’s very impactful and it’s something that we’ll probably have to be in slow cooking just like “I’m No Longer Here.” It’s very ambitious, but I am very much connected to that.
[This interview has been condensed from a longer conversation.]
“I’m No Longer Here” is available worldwide on Netflix.
