Quinceanera (film)

Plot

Magdalena, a fourteen-year-old girl from a working-class Mexican American family in Echo Park, Los Angeles, attends her cousin Eileens quinceanera, an extravagant coming-of-age ceremony to celebrate her fifteenth birthday. Eileens older brother Carlos—who has been disowned by his family due to his homosexuality and now lives with his great-uncle Tomas—arrives at the celebrations but is forced to leave by his father. Magdalena herself is about to turn fifteen but her parents cannot afford to host a quinceanera as lavish as Eileens, and they deny her repeated requests to hire a Hummer limousine for the occasion. While preparing for her quinceanera, Magdalena learns that she is pregnant by her friend Herman although they had only once engaged in non-penetrative intercourse. Her Christian father is furious, believing that Magdalena has had premarital sex despite her protestations that she is still a virgin. She leaves her family to move in with Tomas and Carlos and continues to see Herman until she discovers that his mother has sent him away to live with relatives to prevent him from seeing Magdalena.

Carlos becomes sexually involved with the Caucasian gay couple, James and Gary, who recently bought Tomass property and are now his landlords and neighbors, but he eventually begins a secret affair with Gary without Jamess knowledge. With Magdalenas pregnancy progressing, Carlos offers to financially support her and to act as a surrogate father for the child once it is born. When James discovers his partners affair with Carlos he feels betrayed and Tomas soon receives a letter notifying him that his landlords are evicting him. Tomas, Magdalena and Carlos struggle to find an affordable place to live due to the gentrification of the area and the rising real estate prices, but Tomas dies in his sleep shortly before they are due to be evicted. In the aftermath, Magdalena is reunited with her mother and together they visit a gynecologist, who confirms that Magdalena conceived without having penetrative sex. Magdalenas father apologizes to her at Tomass funeral, believing her conception to be a miracle, and she forgives him.

Magdalena eventually receives the quinceanera she had wished for, complete with a Hummer limousine, with her parents in attendance and Carlos as her escort.

Cast

Production

Quinceanera was written and directed by Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland, filmmaking partners and a romantic couple. They conceived the idea for the film in January 2005, based on their own experiences as a white gay couple moving into the predominantly Latino working-class neighborhood of Echo Park, Los Angeles, as the area underwent gentrification. They were inspired to make a film about the traditional quinceanera celebration after being invited to their fifteen-year-old neighbors ceremony. With producer Anne Clements, they pitched the idea to three investors—immigrants to the United States from Greece and Israel—who agreed to provide $300,000 to finance the project. (The budget was later raised to $400,000.) Glatzer and Westmoreland then wrote the screenplay over three weeks in February.

Casting for the film took place over March 2005 through the internet, a Los Angeles-based organization for Latino actors, and word of mouth. Glatzer and Westmoreland chose to cast non-union actors; none of the cast except Chalo Gonzalez belonged to the Screen Actors Guild. Most of the actors were nonprofessional and had never acted in a film before. Emily Rioss only experience before playing the lead role of Magdalena was in a school play, while Jesse Garcia had only acted in commercials. The films own casting director, Jason L. Wood, ended up playing the character of James, and Glatzer and Westmoreland cast their cleaning lady in a small role. They borrowed props from their cleaners niece, who had recently had a quinceanera, and mimicked her video of the ceremony to create part of the film. Although the script called for the actors to speak "Spanglish"—a mixture of English and Spanish—neither Glatzer nor Westmoreland were fluent in Spanish, so many of the actors translated their own lines from English. The teenage cast members also improvised dialogue for some scenes and provided their own clothes to wear in character.

The film was shot over eighteen days in April 2005. It was filmed on location in Echo Park inside Glatzer and Westmorelands house and in three houses on their block that their neighbors allowed them to use for little or no money. Many of Glatzer and Westmorelands Echo Park neighbors also stood in as extras. Due to Californias child labor laws, they could only film with the underage cast members for six hours a day, so cinematographer Eric Steelberg used a hand-held camera with few accessories to maximize the time they could spend filming. Steelberg filmed the project in high-definition video format, which was converted to film during post-production. The films soundtrack included reggaeton songs as well as music composed by Westmorelands brother as a favor since the filmmakers could afford little else. Robin Katz finished editing the film in August 2005.

Release

Quinceanera premiered on January 23, 2006, at the Sundance Film Festival, where it won both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award in the dramatic feature category. Its U.S. distribution rights were bought by Sony Pictures Classics while its international rights were purchased by Celluloid Dreams. The film was later screened at the Berlin International Film Festival before its theatrical release.

The film opened in limited release in the United States on August 4, 2006, earning $95,400 on its opening weekend from eight theatres. It gradually expanded over the next three weeks, achieving a widest release of 96 theatres by its fourth weekend. Its theatrical run lasted for 14 weeks, concluding with a total gross of $1,692,693. It grossed $830,094 internationally, making a total box office gross of $2,522,787.

It was released in DVD format on January 9, 2007. Extra features on the DVD included an audio commentary with Glatzer, Westmoreland and the films actors, a "making-of" featurette, and a mock quinceanera home video made by Glatzer and Westmoreland.

Critical response

Quinceanera received generally positive reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 86%, based on 95 reviews, with an average rating of 7.1/10. The sites consensus reads, "This slice-of-life story of a teenage girl in Echo Park is both a sweet crowd-pleaser and a perceptive look at socioeconomic community issues." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 72 out of 100, based on reviews from 31 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

Variety critic David Rooney summarized Quinceanera as "a fresh, spirited drama, charming and unpretentious" as well as a "small gem of a movie with a stirring soul". He praised the "subdued, natural performances" of the inexperienced teenaged actors as well as Chalo Gonzalezs portrayal of Tomas. Stephen Holden of The New York Times described the film as "smart and warmhearted" with "a wonderfully organic feel for the fluid interaction of cultures and generations" in Los Angeles. Slate???s Dana Stevens commended the film for avoiding cliches and for its "sharp-eyed analysis of class conflict". She singled out the performance of Emily Rios, whom she said "carries the movie on her square broad shoulders". Claudia Puig of USA Today awarded the film three out of four stars and described it as "spirited and poignant", with Rios performance providing "the heart of the film". Wesley Morris, writing for The Boston Globe, found the film to be "a modest but remarkably poignant comedy" and believed that, despite the predictability of the broader story, "somehow it feels authentic in all its small details". The San Francisco Chronicle?????s Ruthe Stein commented that the film was "directed with obvious love" by Glatzer and Westmoreland and commended Gonzalez for his "hypnotic performance" as Tomas. Gianni Truzzi, who reviewed the film for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, wrote of its "charm, sensitivity and intelligence" as well as the "great authenticity" of Rioss portrayal of Magdalena.

Conversely, Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly, who gave the film a C grade, found the plot "contrived" and melodramatic, and summarized it as "suds being sold as ethno-sensitive reality". The Christian Science Monitor???s Peter Rainer felt that the Quinceanera "is best approached with lowered expectations", and that despite being "heartfelt and well-observed" it failed to adequately explore its contrasting themes of race, sexuality and religion.

Awards and nominations