Shane Slater
Through the Global section of their annual Film & TV lineup, SXSW has premiered some of the most inspired Latin American filmmaking in recent years. In keeping in that vein, the latest Audience Award winner in this section was the Dominican Republic’s Bionico’s Bachata. Directed by Yoel Morales, the film follows the madcap odyssey of its titular character Bionico, who is determined to shake his drug addiction and live out a fairytale romance with his fiancée. The result is an unforgettable and unpredictable cinematic experience. It was a therefore a pleasure for Awards Radar to speak with the film’s director Morales, screenwriter Cristian Mojica and cinematographer Alexander Viola to discuss the making of the film.
Shane Slater: This film is so wild and outrageous. What was the inspiration for the charcater Bionico?
Yoel Morales: We know two guys from our neighborhood in Santo Domingo, named Capotillo. It is a neighborhood with many writers, artists, a lot of drugs too. But we knew these two guys have a very close friendship and you can feel the love for each other. They also were very good people and very happy people. So, we got the idea of a world that deals with these kind of characters. Five, six years later, we start to see the love situation in the plot and we started to write the script in 2021.
SS: Was it easy to sell the film to get support and funding?
YM: Well, it was the normal process of the island, because we didn’t speak a lot about all the details in the film. We just said the plot has this guy with a struggle, searching for a job and it’s a love story. In our country, the principal theme in our films is presenting the beauty, the joy on the island. But the other reality exists too, so we are interested in these kinds of stories. This kind of environment is where we grew up.
Alexander Viola: It represents our Blackness more. For example, my family, we play drums to the saints, and we have the Santero and all these influences. It was a place where slaves were taken to. So we have a strong history of this kind of story in that part of the island. In the north there are more Spaniards. In the east, there were more of the slaves and Tainos. And in the south is like a mix between Spaniards and Tainos, and the Black people are not present. So, we try to tell fun and thrilling stories with our roots.
SS: When you watch the film, you can’t imagine anyone else but Manuel Raposo in the lead role. Was he always the actor you had in mind for this part?
AV: When I read the script, they told me, “It’s Manuel.” We’ve worked with him before and we felt that it’s Manuel, because he’s a kind-hearted guy. He’s not a bad person. He’s just in this situation.
YM: Manuel has this kindness and he’s very funny. So Manuel is perfect for the role.
SS: The film’s themes and energy reminded me of Trainspotting. Was it a big influence on this film? Which films or filmmakers inspired you?
YM: It’s maybe impossible to walk away from Trainspotting, because it is the big movie about these themes. But we weren’t inspired directly. We were searching more in the world of the series Atlanta, because they worked more in surrealism. So Atlanta was a very big influence.
Another influence was the world of the Safdie brothers. They are geniuses. And Sean Baker, through Tangerine.
SS: This must have been a very physical shoot, not just for the actors, but also for the cinematographer. Can you talk about working on the film and the challenges of this kind of filmmaking?
AV: The environment is like, we wanted freedom. Like our music dembow, in a way. To be inventive. It was intuitive, you know? It was difficult in a way, because we were shooting in places that didn’t have a lot of support.
YM: Yes, in the preproduction process, we talked a lot about the camera being like a character in the movie. So we established some rules, because we were a little concerned about making poverty porn, you know? Because we are in a very marginalized environment and context, it’s too easy to fall into that. So we made up rules, but the theory was freedom.
AV: And we made them feel cool because this is like their whole life and situation. So we tried to maintain this coolness and these characters.
Shane Slater: Did you use a lot of non-actors?
YM: It’s impossible to write these microexpressions. We bring these persons, put them in front of the camera and give them small direction, you know? Like, this is the space, this is the context, the situation. And they were alive in the camera. So, we had the script with dialogue and other stuff, but it was more like explaining the contex and if we have a very specific dialogue. This method was very effective for the movie.
[This interview has been edited for length and clarity]
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