Video Interview: Melina Leon – Song Without a Name | Intl. Feature Film Entry for the 93rd Academy Awards

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Peru’s official submission for the ‘Best International Feature’ category at the 93rd Academy Awards in 2021 is Melina Leon’s directorial debut Song Without a Name, which premiered at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival in the Directors’ Fortnight. Beyond being the first Peruvian woman to premiere at the festival in this sidebar, Leon’s striking debut, which revisits a dark period of her country’s past and is informed with semi-autobiographical inspiration, has gone on to play at hundreds of venues on the festival circuit to considerable acclaim. IONCINEMA.com had a chance to meet the filmmaker at the 2019 edition of PYIFF (watch here) and here I cap off the final stretch for the film discussing her influences, casting, the considerable amount of time which went into her long-gestating debut, as well as plans for her next project.

https://youtu.be/7autyBNkW38

Nicholas Bell
Nicholas Bell
Los Angeles based Nicholas Bell is IONCINEMA.com's Chief Film Critic and covers film festivals such as Sundance, Berlin, Cannes and TIFF. He is part of the critic groups on Rotten Tomatoes, The Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA), FIPRESCI, the Online Film Critics Society (OFCS) and GALECA. His top 3 for 2023: The Beast (Bonello) Poor Things (Lanthimos), Master Gardener (Schrader). He was a jury member at the 2019 Cleveland International Film Festival.

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