THE CUBAN OPERA | TRAILER | 3 MIN | Help us to get to San Francisco resuming production.
" I think you can have 10,000 explanations for failure, but no good explanation for success " – Paulo Coelho
Written and Directed by
BEN HIRT is a filmmaker based out of London UK. Ben's professional career in film and television allowed him to work throughout various countries in Europe, before furthering his education at the Film/ Animation/ Video Department of the Rhode Island School of Design RISD [BFA], as well as The London Film School [MA Screenwriting]. His film- and animation work has screened at festivals including the New York Short Film Festival as well as Times Square in New York City. Over the past 10 years, Ben has been is teaching as part time faculty and senior lecturer at the Rhode Island School of Design, the University of the Arts Philadelphia as well as Columbia University of New York City. Ben is currently Year One Leader of the BA Animation Course at the University of the Arts London [Moving image & Digital Arts Program].
Produced by
RAM DEVINENI is a documentary filmmaker, technologist, and founder of Rattapallax. He produced The Russian Woodpecker, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award. The film was purchased by Amazon and shown in commercial theaters in New York City and Los Angeles. His most recent film, The Karma Killings, about the Nithari serial killings was out exclusively on Netflix worldwide. The Karma Killings is hailed as “true crime watershed moment” in India. He is the multimedia editor at the Virginia Quarterly Review, and the founder and editor of Rattapallax magazine, which has received numerous grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and New York State Council for the Arts. In addition, he co-founded Brazil’s first and biggest independent film school, Academia Internacional de Cinema with branches in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. He is the co-creator of the comic book, Priya’s Shakti, Priya’s Mirror, and Priya and the Lost Girls which received the Tribeca Film Institute New Media Fund from the Ford Foundation and supported by the World Bank, and showcased at 2016 New York Film Festival. For creating India’s first female superhero who is a rape survivor, he was named a “gender equality champion” by UN Women and named by Fast Company magazine as one of the most creative people in business in 2017. He was a featured speaker at hundreds of festivals such as TEDx at London Museum, Dresher Center for the Humanities, ARTBO in Bogota, Delhi Comic Convention, Myriad Festival in Australia, Bookwork Festival in Beijing, Games for Change Festival, Cooler Lumpur Literary Festival, and SXSW Interactive.
NEW YORK CITY (PART 01) | 36MIN | ROUGH CUT At the age of 37, Alejandro tries his luck as a professional opera singer one last time. Living out of a storage unit and sleeping in parks at night, Alejandro manages to minimise his overhead. By performing in various places around the city, Alejandro draws attention to himself and (un)expectedly gets lucky!
NEW YORK CITY (PART 02) | 36MIN | ROUGH CUT Roaming the streets of New York City, performing in various spaces whilst making a living, Alejandro decides to take his life temporarily elsewhere.
MIAMI (Part 03) | 40MIN | ROUGH CUT Alejandro moves from New York City to Miami (FL), where he reunites with his friends. In pursuit of making new connections within the world of opera, Alejandro suddenly finds new opportunities.
CUBA (PART 04) | 39MIN | ROUGH CUT Alejandro returns back to his roots and homeland, where his grandmother has fallen ill, hoping to make it back on time.
*THIS VIDEO IS CURRENTLY IN PRODUCTION AND NOT YET AVAILABLE FOR VIEWING
VIENNA (Part 05) | 23MIN | ROUGH CUT Searching for a place to stay in Vienna, Alejandro gets lucky but suddenly faces unexpected challenges when performing in public.
SAN FRANCISCO (Part 06) | 39MIN | ROUGH CUT Having found a permanent home in San Francisco, Alejandro comes to terms with his past and future self.