PORT

This is an introduction short film as well as a 26-minute-trailer for a feature length film (work in progress) shot in Juarez, Mexico.

On a swaying ferry that sails up the East River in New York, Jose Luis Rico recites “Port”, a poem that reflects on the shift in his and his friend Luis Alberto’s life as they came of age in the midst of the drug wars in Mexico.

The film is shot as one long take of the recitation among the moving sceneries. with a sunset, a fluttering flag in the wind, ferry tourists, the iconic New York skyline and a helicopter that takes off into the autumn sky.

  • Hiroshi Sunairi
    Director
    making mistakes, air, MAJULAH SINGAPURA, Where It Flows Out Into the Plains, 48 years – Silent Dictator
  • José Luis Rico
    Writer
  • Hiroshi Sunairi
    Producer
  • José Luis Rico
    Key Cast
  • Motomu Ishigaki
    DP
    Wonderland, Flushing Web Series, Dancing on the Beach, The Man with a Teddy Bear, Jenny
  • Project Type:
    Documentary, Experimental
  • Runtime:
    26 minutes 27 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    August 1, 2016
  • Production Budget:
    5,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    Japan
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    Spanish
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Experimental Forum 2017
    Los Angeles
    United States
    Honorable Mention Award
  • FILMVIRUS WILDTYPE: Rhizome program
    Bangkok
    Thailand
    November 18, 2017
    World Premiere
Director Biography - Hiroshi Sunairi

“What the modern movie lacks is beauty,” said D.W. Griffith, “the beauty of the moving wind in the trees.”

Born in Hiroshima in 1972, Sunairi lives in NYC. In the last decade, Sunairi has been making film works, expanding and experimenting with contents and forms of documentary films. From personal issues to collective memory and the public sphere, Sunairi creates each film’s distinct approach and style; Making Mistakes, a soul-searching journey in Tibet, COSMIC MOVEMENTS, a traditional ethnography on a group of Mexican Americans and Chicanos – indigenous people with roots in Mexico practicing the tradition of Anahuac (Aztec), Where it flows out into the plains, a meditative and spritual travelogue in India, air, about the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, 48 years – 沈黙の独裁者 (48 years – Silent Dictator), an interview documentary with Iwao Hakamada, known as the world’s longest-held death row inmate.

Currently Sunairi is in post-production with 石川真生 – オキナワより愛を込めて / Mao Ishikawa – From Okinawa with Love, about a Okinawan photographer Mao Ishikawa’s photo book of okinawan women with American GI and the history of sexual crimes by the US military in Okinawa, as well as Qué Tan Lejos / How Far Am I, a meditation on the relationship between reality and creation/poetry, personal and universal values in the changing context of a city, Juarez that rose out of the drug war in Mexico. The script was co-written with the protagonist, José Luis Rico.

Sunairi is researching to shoot in 2020, Das, a hybrid experimental biography/fiction/documentary film of Jibanananda Das, a Bengali poet, writer, novelist and essayist, known as the “most alone of poets.” The film will be written in collaboration with Maitreyee Bhattacharjee Chowdhury and Amish Josh.

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Director Statement

Poetry in cinema

Poetry in Cinema, that is the basis for our filmic adventure with this short film/trailer as well as our fiction film, planned to be shot in Dec 2017.

Straub-Huillet had done major work presenting text in cinema. Sometimes with such restrictions so text is the only component that is active instead of the one that recites it.

"Poet on a business trip" by Ju Anqi had opened up a new territory by having written text on black screen in his cinema. In this crazy travelogue by a young poet boy, his poem shows up on screen with music, interrupting the film, injecting intimate, humorous and profound reflection on life.

So our shorts, "PORT," we tried one long take, fixed shots, but with moving scenery. The water, movement, landscape interrupts and complicates the abstraction of Jose's poem.

The poem, not explicitly, deals with the troubled city and the hometown of the poet, Juarez. His best friend, a journalist was once captured by the gangs and he was determined that he was going to be killed. The poem touches upon the incident by seeing his old friend afterwards, creating a greater distance between them.