Hermanos Casablanca: a mission in hard times
After the successful run of the short film “Waldo’s Dream” from production company Lunes, the same team prepares for the premiere of their following short film in 2D animation: “Hermanos Casablanca”, a story about the two ways to deal with pain, revenge or forgiveness.
Everything started about 12 years ago, making this short film one of the first projects by Lunes. The project was put on hold for different reasons, however, the team thought that the plot conveys important messages and a story that works very well as a short film. “It was something different than what was being done in animation. We even considered making it as live action many times. Hermanos Casablanca could have been perfectly filmed.”, says José Navarro, co-directing with Santiago O’Ryan.
“We thought that with this story we could talk about the Chilean dictatorship on a human level. To review more intimately the different characters that participated in this part of history, from both factions.”, explains Navarro.
With around eleven years in the industry, Lunes is a production company composed of 3 scriptwriters, Jorge Campusano, Santiago O’Ryan and José Navarro. Lunes specializes in the creation and development of original content. As a team, they say that what they enjoy the most is the development of projects for different audiences, formats and techniques, despite having big hits such as the series and feature film “Homeless”, and the short films “Waldo’s Dream” and “Asilo Esperanza.”
The story of “Hermanos Casablanca” is about Gabriel and Antonio, two brothers, fishermen divers from the south of Chile during the dictatorship. The two brothers will have to search for the body of an army officer’s son lost at sea, in exchange for information about the whereabouts of their sister, a detainee who disappeared during the military dictatorship.
With “Hermanos Casablanca” Lunes won the Audiovisual Fund, which covered the pre-production stage and editing. For this process, they collaborated with Argentinian production company Rudo, a studio that has become a point of reference within the animated production field in Argentina. They wanted to find an aesthetic that was consistent with their target audience and that, at the same time, had their own style. “We created something really good with Rudo. They had the experience and skills to visually express what we wanted to achieve with Hermanos Casablanca. They worked on the animation production process for the short, meanwhile the pre-production, executive production and direction of the project were done in Chile, at our studio.” José Navarro said. He also mentioned, when asked about any anecdotes during production due to COVID-19, that “Fortunately, we were able to cope with the pandemic without problems. The advantage of animation is that it can be done remotely, and although there are moments in the process when being on site is fundamental, technology helps dealing with that situation. Of course, a barbecue with our Argentinean friends is still pending, there is no technology that can replace that.”
The team is currently looking for financing for post-production and distribution. They hope to finish the short by the end of 2021 and submit it to animation festivals. “We work on this type of project simply because we love telling stories. This is why we want this story to be seen by as many people as possible and, hopefully, it finds its way to a digital platform.” Says Navarro.