Tecuani (Houston Short Film)

My name is Giovanni Guillén. I am a Mexican-American writer and filmmaker from Houston, TX. Currently I'm in pre-production on a Spanish-language short film titled Tecuani. Though I've been writing and developing ideas for shorts and features for over ten years, Tecuani will mark my directorial debut.

Synopsis :

A young Mexican-American actor visits his old neighborhood in Houston. Told through narrations, a new acquaintance will describe time spent with the actor and shared memories they have of Spring Branch. The film will touch on gentrification in Houston and also reference tecuani, a wild cat represented in traditional Mexican folk dances.

There were several things I had in mind when writing this. I knew that I wanted to set it in Spring Branch , that it would be in Spanish, and that I would shoot on a micro budget. I’ve had positive experiences shooting on a Krasnogorsk-3 purchased last year and so I'm committed to using 16mm film. Thus the vast majority of the budget will be spent on purchasing film rolls for all stages (developing, scanning, and transferring to digital). The rest of the money raised will be used to feed our cast and crew, and pay our two actors a day rate.

In a lot of ways Tecuani is an exercise in gaining experience and to test myself as a filmmaker. I wrote something very simple but still very close and personal to me. I would like the opportunity to work with creative freedom in order to bring this idea to life.

Thank you for contributing/sharing.