Suripanta (Short Film)

Suripanta, our first production as a creative team in 2008, has made its online debut. For this project I collaborated with producing partner Edward E. Cohen, who also plays the friendly transvestite on the film.

Suripanta tells the story of a young man (Fernando Arroyo, El Cielo Dividido) that goes to a Hispanic neighborhood in Los Angeles where a transvestite prostitute (Edward E. Cohen, J. Edgar) will help him find the woman he’s looking for. Ramona (Paola Ochoa, Ciudades Obscuras), his mother, isn’t what he expected, she’s a cheap prostitute that refuses to accept her long lost son.

I was 20 years old when I first attempted to direct a full production team. I collaborated with cinematographer Dimistris Bogiantzis who studied with me the photography from some of Pedro Almodovar’s films. I was a big Almodóvar fan back then, and so I conceived this story as a tribute to who I consider the king of Spanish-twisted-witty-mellodrama.

Suripanta was nominated for an Imagen Award in Los Angeles, CA in 2008. It screened at Frameline 33 in San Francisco, CA, the largest LGBT film festival in the country. It won the Best Short Award at the Long Island Latino International film festival.