Aldo Francia

If there is a filmmaker who embodies the socalled New Chilean Cinema it is Aldo Francia Although he was the author of a short filmography of only two finished films Valparaíso mi amor 1969 and Ya no basta con rezar 1972 France understood cinema from the first moment as a collective action and his individual authorship always remained in the background with respect to his most beloved creation the Viña del Mar Film Festival A pediatrician by profession Aldo Francia developed as a selftaught filmmaker As he recalls in his book New Latin American Cinema in Viña del Mar 1990 his first approach to cinema took place in Paris on a cold autumn afternoon in November 1949 On one of those evenings in a small cinema in the quartier on the side of Boulevard Saint Michel where the film projector had just been turned off and the lights on in the room we all found ourselves with tearful eyes without any possibility of concealing it They had just projected Bicycle Thief by Vittorio de Sica And we had the feeling that something new had started in the cinema At that moment being already a doctor I decided that one day I would also be a filmmaker Francia Aldo New Latin American Cinema in Viña del Mar Santiago CESOC ChileAmerica 1990 242 p The exhibition of the classic of Italian Neorealism left a deep impression in Francia He soon got a Paillard 8mm camera and began a career as an amateur filmmaker Paris in autumn 1957 Paceña 1959 about the indigenous neighborhoods of the city of La Paz Carnaval 1960 filmed in Rio de Janeiro and Lluvia 1961 made in the Latin quarter of Paris were his first works He later founded a Cine Club 1962 built the Cine Arte cinema in Viña del Mar created a film magazine and once all that was achieved launched an international call for other amateur filmmakers from around the world Thus was born the first Viña del Mar Amateur Film Festival 1963In that city the greatest Latin American film meeting of the time was held and Aldo Francia was its host par excellence He discovered that his desire to make and learn was also a way to generate social change The airs and graces of the revolution turned Viña del Mar into the ideal space for reflection and dissemination of a cinema in process