THE SKY IS VERY PRETTY

Synopsis:

A shelter in southern Mexico offers a safe space for migrant and refugee women and girls. Their experience of migration is marked by different viewpoints and the diverse implications it carries for their lives. 'The Sky Is Very Pretty' explores the contrast between the fear of an uncertain future, the desires of a mother and the joy and dreams of her daughters.

Aracely Méndez

Short Bio

Aracely Méndez (Mexico, 1984) is a Maya Tseltal sociologist, defender and filmmaker. She collaborates with OSCs, networks and groups that defend the human rights of migrating and native women. Interested in audiovisual media, she has been trained in a variety of diploma programs, the last being at the San Cristóbal de las Casas Documentary Film School, where she directed “The Sky Is Very Pretty”, a documentary about migrating women and girls.

Full Bio

Aracely Méndez (Mexico, 1984) is a Maya Tseltal sociologist, defender and filmmaker. She is originally from Chanal, Chiapas. She collaborates with social organizations and networks that work for the human rights of migrating and native women. She is a member of Movilidades Libres y Elegidas A.C. CoLibres.

As a filmmaker, she has sought to approach cinema from a critical perspective, as well as from an ethical and aesthetical proposal appropriated by indigenous peoples. In her work, she reflects on the importance of documentary filmmaking from auto-representation and careful and collective processes.

She directed the documentary short film “The Sky Is Very Pretty”, which has been presented at world festivals and showcases, where it has received diverse awards and accolades. She has collaborated in other documentaries, like “Remington” by Magali Caballero, “Don de Ser” by Néstor Jiménez, and “Voces” by Alejandra Gómez Castro.

She is currently with the Maya Múuch’ Xíimbal Assembly for the filming of documentaries in defense of the land and territory in the peninsula. She is also writing a documentary feature titled “¿Quién es Me’Lupe?”.

Statement:

For many women, their stories are crossed by migratory processes when leaving, running away from a land, forced to search for new and better living conditions, an exodus that overnight turns upside down their lives (and their families’) in Central America countries. 'The Sky Is Very Pretty' is just a fragment of women and girls stories who live migration at a place in the South of Mexico, full of contrasts between mothers and daughters with dreams, joy and fear towards an uncertain future. They allow me to recognize and dignify my female, migrant being.