REEL DE ORO

The Argentinean director, Facundo Españón, remembers that his first camera was one his father bought on a family trip in the US. “We did a road trip with my family from Miami to New York on the interstate 95 highway that took around a month. I was 12 or 13 and didn´t let go of the camera in the whole trip. I filmed about 15 VCR tapes with my voice in off, narrating everything we did”.Españón studied four years of Industrial Engineering and then realized he wanted to study Cinema and Photography. In the University of Buenos Aires, he graduated as a filmmaker and then went further into script writing in the SICA. He also studied English at Cambridge, which is why he feels very well in the Hispanic and in the general market in the US.He began in the industry as assistant director in cinema and advertising. He started directing commercials three years ago and has filmed more than 30 spots for important agencies and clients in Argentina, Chile and the US. He is represented in Argentina by Blu, in Chile by Cienbrazos and in North America by Carbo Films. “The last thing I filmed were two very pretty commercials for YPF. It was a very big campaign, with several days of shooting, blending scenes from two scripts that came from two different agencies and were very different one from the other. We traveled a lot throughout the country and the result was very good. It was an excellent way to end the year, traveling and shooting, that are the two things I like to do most”.In 2015 he published his first photography book, 2000 light years from home, titled like the theme by the Rolling Stones . “I never worked as a photographer and I love that because I feel very free in that sense. I take pictures of whatever I want whenever I want, specially when I travel, and I’m happy and satisfied if I like them” he said. He is currently working on the development of two script projects to make his first feature film. “One is a genre film, a police story with a high dose of porteño elements: meaning what it is to live in Buenos Aires. The other is a biography of an Argentinean rock star that I want to shoot in black and white, like, Control, the film about Ian Curtis by Joy Division. Let’s see which one I finish writing first”. “I love to film. That passion for what I do is what drives me the most as an audiovisual director. I try to give my best when I am shooting, whether it’s a commercial, a video clip or a short film and in the future in the films I make” he expressed. “I like to tell stories and I feel very comfortable directing actors but I also have a very aesthetic reel, with several works that have a carefully handled art direction”.Españón confesses he has an excellent relationship with agencies and clients in all the countries he has worked in. “I enjoy a lot taking part in the whole creative process. From the moment I receive a script I start to think about the commercial and how I would like to do it and I always try to give it a twist and include my view. But in this process I talk with the agency a lot so they tell me how they see it” he explained. “It is a nice challenge, because you arrive with a fresh vision to become part of a team, both with the agency and the client”.Buenos Muchachos by Martin Scorsese is one of the director´s favorite films. He admits being a fan of Scorsese´s films, documentaries and even his commercials. “The topics he deals with, how he directs actors, how he uses the camera, the music, the staging, the voice in off. And I think that Buenos Muchachos is one of his masterpieces” he explained.In the future he would like to work with Nike, Johnnie Walker and Stella Artois. He would also like to make some perfume commercials. “From last year I would have liked to film the Magnum campaign: Be True To Your Pleasure, that the Lola de España agency made” he expressed.One of his new projects is the direction of a videoclip. “I am a music lover and I love everything that surrounds a band. Since I didn´t become a rock musician, I became a director. I love making videoclips, because it connects me with this world”.Production Company:Carbo Films, USAContact: {Julia Camara-Calvo;julia@carbofilms.com} T +1-310-823-5400{Watch video;http://www.produ.com/publicidad/videos/index.html?Noti=10701}