Titixe, 2018, 63 min, Dir. Tania Hernández Velasco

As part of the educational program “El Ombligo de Maguey, o cómo entender la Ciudad de México desde sus ecosistemas alimentarios”, this film will be screened. It tells the story of the last farmer in a Mexican family who, with his death, took with him all the wisdom needed to work the land. With no agricultural experience, his daughter and granddaughter (the director of this film) attempt one last planting to convince the grandmother to keep the family land. Together they find the traces of this man and his work: sprouts dancing to the sound of norteñas, a mourning tree, the language of the clouds, ghosts, stories, and many seeds.

Guia Toó. Montaña poderosa, 1998, 53 min, Dir. Crisanto Manzano

The second film to be screened will be this visual essay by Zapotec filmmaker Crisanto Manzano Abella (member of the Sistema Nacional de Creadores, SNCA),which conveys the energy and vitality of the natural environment in the territory of his community, Tanetze de Zaragoza. The video presents a worldview of the interweaving of nature with its landscapes, plants, resources, and animals, which resemble a living entity in continuous relationship with human inhabitants. Produced as an audiovisual documentary journey, the creator seeks to convey the powerful relationship between the lush nature and the cloud forest, offering a poetic vision of the life and production of the Zapotec farmers, as well as a metaphor for the concept of territory at the community level in order to be alert to threats; thus, he values the relationship that this people needs to maintain with their environment.

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