Landfall – Editor
2020, 93 minDirected & Produced by Cecilia Aldarondo in Collaboration with Associate Producer Lale Namerrow Pastor Edited by Terra Jean Long Cinematography Pablo Alvarez-Mesa & Martin DiCicco Produced by Ines Hofmann Khanna Composer Angélica Negrón Executive Producers Charlotte Cooke & Laura Poitras.
Through shard-like glimpses of everyday life in post-Hurricane María Puerto Rico, Landfall is a cautionary tale for our times. Set against the backdrop of protests that toppled the US colony’s governor in 2019, the film offers a prismatic portrait of collective trauma and resistance. While the devastation of María attracted a great deal of media coverage, the world has paid far less attention to the storm that preceded it: a 72-billion-dollar debt crisis crippling Puerto Rico well before the winds and waters hit.
Landfall examines the kinship of these two storms—one environmental, the other economic—juxtaposing competing utopian visions of recovery. Featuring intimate encounters with Puerto Ricans as well as the newcomers flooding the island, Landfall reflects on a question of contemporary global relevance: when the world falls apart, who do we become?
Awards
- DOC NYC Film Festival // Grand Jury Award, Viewfinders Competition
- Florida Film Festival // Grand Jury Award
- Guanajuato International Film Festival // Best International Documentary
- Milwaukee Film Festival // Best Documentary
- Boston Latino Film Festival // Best Documentary
- New Orleans Film Festival // Jury Honorable Mention
Press
“an exquisite film, by turns tender and compassionate, cinematically adventurous and self-assured”
—Filmmaker Magazine
“extraordinarily prescient… a crisis can bring out the worst in people, but also the best”
—Moveable Fest
“It is this multiplicity that allows Landfall to excel. Without presenting a straightforward narrative of recovery it considers both the unprocessed grief and the sense of relief that so many carry with them”
—The New York Times
“For those of us whose memory of Hurricane Maria boils down to footage of President Donald Trump scornfully tossing out paper towels to a crowd at a disaster relief center, Cecilia Aldarondo’s documentary Landfall offers up a welcome flipside”
—Hollywood Reporter
Festivals
- Tribeca Film Festival
- Hot Docs Film Festival
- IDFA Film Festival
- RIDM Film Festival