10 · 23 · 09

“Morelia is a place to make friends,” Anamaría Marinca

Clara Sánchez

Marinca graduated from the University of Fine Arts, Music and Theater George Enescu de Iasi, where she later taught. In her third visit to Morelia, she attended different presentations of Romanian, Mexican and international films.

The expressive 31-year-old actress said she had a “wonderful time” at the festival. “I saw marvelous films,” she said with a big smile. “I loved Presumed Guilty [which won Best Feature Documentary] and Hadewijch by Bruno Dumont. I also saw many Romanian documentaries that I’d never seen before.”

Marinca, who is recognized by the European Film Promotion Board as a European movie star, said she finds many similarities between Mexico and Romania. “We have many things in common. Our traditional dress with its floral patterns even has the same colors,” she said. “The way we externalize our emotions is even similar. I thought our films were too Romanian, that our jokes were too local, but the Mexican audience understood them perfectly.

“Boogie, which I appear in, is a story about a couple who are in their thirties and are trying to be responsible adults,” she said. “This is a universal problem, but the way it is told is very Romanian. I didn’t think the audience would understand it, but we received a very positive reaction. People were very interested in present-day Romania and our social reality. When I saw Presumed Guilty I realized we have very similar problems. I think we are united by the origin of our languages, since both are Romance languages.”

During the screening of Boogie, which opened the Romanian film cycle in Morelia, the actress was present along with Manuela Vulpe, Romanian ambassador in Mexico. “Actors and sports figures are always the best ambassadors of their countries,” Vulpe said. “I feel I’m in competition with Anamaría [she laughs]. I think she does a better job.”
 
Winner of the Best Actress of the Year Award in 2000 at the Young Actor Gala of Mangalia, Marinca said she considered Morelia to be “one of the few festivals where you can sit down and talk with other invited guests, not necessarily to make business contacts but to build friendships.”

A member of the jury at the Sarajevo festival where the film Rudo y Cursi by Carlos Cuarón won awards, the actress said she thinks Mexican cinema is going through a very exciting period. “For years I’ve admired González Iñárritu and Carlos Reygadas. I don’t know a lot because it’s not easy to see Mexican films in Romania. Distribution is difficult. It’s even hard to see Romanian films since we’re invaded by Blockbusters. Sometimes even when a [Romanian] film has won very important awards it is not screened in Romania.”

Marinca would like to work in another “great project” so she can return to Morelia. “We feel very honored to be here,” she said. “We would love to maintain the closeness that has been established between our two countries. Perhaps we can even get more Mexican films to be shown in Romania.”

The Romanian Film Cycle will be shown at the Cineteca Nacional from Oct. 23 to Nov. 5. Consult program and schedule.

Translated by Cindy Hawes