I decided to go to the New York PitchXchange, so I can pitch my movie idea (Bordertown) to producer Bob Kosberg, even though I haven't completed the script and don't expect to before I see him on June 10. Kosberg always encourages people to pitch ideas--not necessarily scripts. He especially likes ideas derived from news stories, and my script is based on such a news story.
As I mentioned in a previous journal entry, my script is loosely based on the 1994 assassination of Luis Donaldo Colosio, the PRI candidate for President of Mexico. In my story, I've altered some facts; changed, for instance, the assassinated politician to a gubernatorial, instead of a presidential, candidate and compressed events which occurred over years into a period of weeks.
What I'm trying to show is Mexico's movement towards multiparty democracy and away from the single party rule of the PRI that occurred in the assassination's aftermath. I also want to comment on Mexico and the United States. What strikes me, as I write about these two countries, is that, as Mexico becomes more like the United States, the United States becomes more like Mexico.
Mexico now has Presidential debates, political consultants, primaries, polling, and American-style grassroots organizing. In the year 2000, Mexico even had a relatively clean Presidential election in which the PRI candidate, for the first time in 71 years, lost and accepted the loss. In the United States that year, we had a dirty election, the actual winner of which is still disputed. Moreover, while one party (the PRI) no longer dominates politics in Mexico, one party (the Republican party) now dominates politics in the United States. The two countries are moving in opposite directions.
The key to good political and social commentary, of course, is to do it with a light touch--to avoid the heavy-handed approach of, say, Oliver Stone.That's tough to do, but I think I can pull it off.
As I mentioned in a previous journal entry, my script is loosely based on the 1994 assassination of Luis Donaldo Colosio, the PRI candidate for President of Mexico. In my story, I've altered some facts; changed, for instance, the assassinated politician to a gubernatorial, instead of a presidential, candidate and compressed events which occurred over years into a period of weeks.
What I'm trying to show is Mexico's movement towards multiparty democracy and away from the single party rule of the PRI that occurred in the assassination's aftermath. I also want to comment on Mexico and the United States. What strikes me, as I write about these two countries, is that, as Mexico becomes more like the United States, the United States becomes more like Mexico.
Mexico now has Presidential debates, political consultants, primaries, polling, and American-style grassroots organizing. In the year 2000, Mexico even had a relatively clean Presidential election in which the PRI candidate, for the first time in 71 years, lost and accepted the loss. In the United States that year, we had a dirty election, the actual winner of which is still disputed. Moreover, while one party (the PRI) no longer dominates politics in Mexico, one party (the Republican party) now dominates politics in the United States. The two countries are moving in opposite directions.
The key to good political and social commentary, of course, is to do it with a light touch--to avoid the heavy-handed approach of, say, Oliver Stone.That's tough to do, but I think I can pull it off.
VIEW 5 of 5 COMMENTS
tessabbie:
a friends daughter might have lukemia. and i just found out that a girl i was friends with in high school has a daughter, and she is missing with her grandma. noone knows where they are. and my grandmother is dying in the hospital right now. and my mechanic died over the weekend on his 30th birthday. he has three kids under the age of ten. it's been a shity last couple if days.
unravel:
I really like your ideas, hope that something good comes out of you going to New York. Sounds like a movie I would really love to see. Hope that it turns out for you. You definitely have peaked my interest. Let us know what happens in NY. Cool. 
