A State of Madness
Original title: Mis 500 Locos
2020 | 96 minutes | Dominican Republic
Director: Leticia Tonos
Writers: Waddys Jacquez, Lenny Compres
Languages: Spanish
Festival de Cine Global Dominicano, Opening Night Film
Festival de Cine de Malaga - In Focus
This stylish, evocative drama is set in 1953 in the Dominican Republic during the dictatorship of Leonidas Trujillo. After a group of mental patients escapes from the remote Nigüa Psychiatric Hospital, famed psychologist Dr. Antonio Zaglul (Luis José German) is appointed the new director of the institution. His arrival will bring changes, not only to the way things operate within its walls and how patients are treated, but also how Zaglul will be able to keep the Trujillo authorities from meddling with his unorthodox approach to mental illness. Indeed, as pressure mounts from those distant political authorities in Santo Domingo, it soon will become difficult to know whether the madness lives inside or outside the hospital’s walls.
A fascinating portrait of a particular era in the Dominican Republic’s history, A State of Madness is a visually arresting, impressive film noir rendering of a quietly intense drama about power: those who have it, those who don’t, and those caught in between. Ottawa audiences will recall her earlier film, Love Child, presented as part of our 2013 Latin American Film Festival.
- Tom McSorley
Preceded by the short film
Now Is the Time
When internationally renowned Haida carver Robert Davidson was only 22 years old, he was instrumental in changing the history of his people forever, carving the first new totem pole in Old Massett in almost a century. On the 50th anniversary of the pole’s raising, Haida filmmaker Christopher Auchter steps easily through history to revisit that day in August 1969, when the entire village gathered to celebrate the event that would signal the rebirth of the Haida spirit.
Now is the Time and its feature partner, A State of Madness, each examine each examine periods of history where the people harmed by those in power took matters into their own hands.