Mexico’s Teresa Sánchez, winner of a 2022 Sundance World Cinema Dramatic Special Jury Award for acting in Juan Pablo González’s “Dos Estaciones,” is set to star in the follow-up, his sophomore outing “Warm Water.”
Co-directed with Ana Isabel Fernández, co-writer of “Dos Estaciones,” “Warm Water” will also star Rafaela Fuentes, who played opposite Sánchez in “Dos Estaciones.”
Set up at Mexico’s Sin Sitio Cine, whose partners are González, Ilana Coleman, Makena Buchanan and Jamie Gonçalves, “Warm Water,” produced by Bruna Haddad (“La Hija de Todas Las Rabias,” “Dos Estaciones”) and Gonçalves, will be brought onto the market at the San Sebastian Europe-Latin American Co-Production Forum, where it ranks as one of its highest-profile projects.
In development and scheduled to shoot in fall 2024, “Warm Water” turns on Ana María, a renowned actress who, after a devastating break-up, reluctantly travels to the rural countryside in Mexico to lead an acting workshop.
When an enthusiastic participant with whom she has become close suddenly dies in a car accident, a series of strange events push Ana María to face her losses, the synopsis runs.
“‘Agua Caliente’ is a love letter to Isabel’s and my region of origin: the Highlands of Jalisco. This is where all our cinematic work has taken place since 2014. It will be our second collaboration in a feature-length film — the first being ‘Dos estaciones’ (2022) — and our first as co-directors,” González told PvNew.
González’s feature debut, “Dos Estaciones” turned on 50-year-old Maria García (Sánchez), the tightly-coiled but resolute owner of ranch Dos Estaciones, the last of generations of Mexican-owned artisanal tequila plants, the remainder having been taken over by deep-pocketed U.S. tequila brands.
Fuentes played Garcia’s younger head of administration, whom Sánchez courts in a restrained fashion.
Impeccably shot, sometimes bearing a documentary edge and at others capturing the endless skies and cosy hills of Jalisco, “Dos Estaciones” cut through the clichés of the region to depict the disappearance of craft-driven tequila creation, steamrolled by the economies of scale of big U.S. corporations, as well as the Jalisco Highlands’ social nuances, which include larger sexual freedoms and greater social mobility in a still conservative environment.
In a relatively short film career – her first starring role was in Nicolas Pereda’s 2007 “Where Are Their Stories” – Sánchez has been consistently prized for her performances, scoring a Mexican Academy Ariel best actress nomination in 2012 for Pereda’s “Summer of Goliath” and an Ariel best supporting actress nomination in 2019 for Lila Avilés’ “The Chambermaid.”
