IT
| Title | BOCA CHICA |
|---|---|
| Original Title | BOCA CHICA |
| Movie Type | |
| Genre | |
| Section | |
| Country | Dominican Republic |
| Production Year | 2023 |
| Movie Length | 97' |
| Director | |
| Screenplay | |
| Cast | |
| Director of Photography | |
| Editor | |
| Casting | Valerie Hernandez Oloffson |
| Production Designer | Jenn Calcaño |
| Costume Designer | Natalia Aponte |
| Makeup | Odette Pedie |
| Music | José Torres, Aneudy Lara, Krency García "El Prodigio" |
| Produced by | Sterlyn Ramirez |
| Production | |
| International Distribution | Outsider Pictures (USA/Stati Uniti d’America) www.outsiderpictures.us |
| Festival Contact | Outsider Pictures (USA/Stati Uniti d’America) www.outsiderpictures.us |
BOCA CHICA
Desi is a twelve-year-old girl who spends her days dreaming on the beaches of Boca Chica of becoming a famous singer. She works at the family restaurant, Restaurante Vasquez, with her aunt, Nena, and mother, Carmen. Her dreams for her future are threatened by the ever-looming presence of child prostitution in her town. She begins to open her eyes when she realizes her childhood friend from choir, Luz, has stopped coming to practice and goes out late at night scantily clad. Her older brother, Fran, lives in NY, and is widely believed to be a successful musician. He returns from his new life in New York to attend their cousin’s, Elvis, wedding. During his stay in town, Desi is faced with the secrets of her family and the reality that he might be his sister’s only hope to escape her fate and achieve her dreams.
Director's Bio
Gabriella A. Moses is a Dominican-Guyanese American multifaceted filmmaker, based in Brooklyn, NY, known for her work as a director, writer, and production designer. She is an alumna of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Gabriella has garnered support from prestigious organizations such as the Sundance Institute, New York Women in Film & TV, Tribeca Film Institute, The Black List, WScripted, SFFILM, and The Gotham. In 2023, Gabriella was highlighted on the Black List Latinx List and was a participant in the 2022 LALIFF & Netflix Latinx Inclusion Fellowship Program, where she created the short film SIN RAÍCES. Her screenplay EL TIMBRE DE TU VOZ won Best Drama screenplay at Fresh Voices Screenplay competition. Her debut feature BOCA CHICA, set in the Dominican Republic, premiered in International Narrative Competition at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival where she won the prestigious 11th Annual Nora Ephron Award.
Director's Note
“Boca Chica is a film born out of exploring misunderstood worlds. It’s a film that explores a young woman’s relationship with the world of tourism that she was born into and the family secrets that are a part of that world. Secrets that are vital to protecting her sense of home and her dreams. When our producer, Sterlyn Ramírez introduced me to this project, I knew the world well because I had been exposed to it and worked with young girls in similar situations as our protagonist when I went to volunteer and interview the girls at The Mariposa Foundation in Cabarete. The Mariposa Foundation’s main goal is to empower young Dominican girls and to equip them with tools for a better life and a voice in the world. These lessons are incredibly powerful to fight the machismo culture that infiltrates much of the Caribbean. I heard stories from the founder that spoke to many of the girls’ plights. Desi finds herself in a similar position unsure what her future might hold when she starts to realize friends of hers are in similar positions. When I came to the Dominican Republic to direct this film it was a homecoming of sorts. My grandparents when they immigrated to the states with their kids in the pursuit of opportunity that they wanted their family to return there eventually. Deep in my soul I knew I had to do what my mother hadn’t. It was a gift to be able to tell a story in the homeland of my mother and to take the gifts I was able to cultivate and dream I was able to follow as a filmmaker because of their sacrifices to realize a story set in their motherland. It was an important step and journey for me as a filmmaker to be making my first film where it all began for me and culturally the root of every film I’ve made to date.
Overall, this is a story about the strength of a young girl’s convictions to imagine a better future for herself. A future I imagined for myself and that many women on our female helmed crew and cast imagined for themselves and that our protagonist imagined for herself. This is a film that will explore how paradise isn’t all that it seems and beg the question – how do we protect our young women, the people most vulnerable to create a better tomorrow for them to dream and break cycles of abuse and exploitation.”