Photo by Victoria Hernandez.
The nonprofit organization Saint Primo held their first Oak Cliff event on Sunday, June 7.
In partnership with Crecer Dallas Hair Salon, the Grito! showcase brought Latino voices on screen through a curation of short films and music videos made by Latino filmmakers. This type of event is exactly what Saint Primo is about.
The nonprofit is dedicated to elevating, celebrating and empowering Latino voices in film and media. Founded by James Rodriguez, Saint Primo has been Dallas based since Rodriguez made the move to North Texas last year.
“Saint Primo was formed two years ago in Austin, (and) that was kind of a result of me as a filmmaker, and coming from a Hispanic background, typically being the only Hispanic on a film set,” Rodriguez said. “Always the minority on a film set, kind of seeing it in this state where we’re pretty much a majority now, and how is it that we represent less than 6% in front of the camera and less than 4% behind the camera? When I say behind the camera, that’s producer roles, director roles. So there was an incredibly large gap in terms of representation in film, especially with the Latino community.”
Rodriguez said that the inspiration for the creation of Saint Primo also comes from his own personal story, having a lack of resources and access to film school. His goal is to create a more accessible pipeline for the Latino community to gain the skills needed to enter the industry.
“This is more like workforce solutions,” he said. “There’s a lot of jobs coming in the film industry in the state, especially in the DFW area and Austin, and these are positions that a lot of them are being filled by people outside of our community, and not just that, people from outside of Texas. There’s a lot of people from Los Angeles moving to Texas to take these jobs, so we have a whole community here that is interested, wanting to work, wanting these jobs as well, but they don’t have anybody to teach them how to get into the film industry, what it really takes, and it’s really our workshops and organization is demystifying kind of the film industry alone. If you don’t come from it, we’re here to teach you how it works, and at the same time.”
Past workshops held throughout Austin and the DFW area have included entry-level strategies for skills needed as a production assistant and learning hair and makeup. The workshops have an entry fee that is meant to be as accessible as possible. Showcases, like the free June 7 event at Crecer, are done to bring a spotlight to current filmmakers from our community who are doing great work and letting the community audience see them, he said.
“The whole idea is we want these filmmakers to be seen. It was all about visibility and getting them to be seen by the community,” Rodriguez said. “And then a byproduct of that is they get to socialize and network and meet all these new people, and hopefully my personal goal is that someone in the audience … will see these films and say ‘These people came from where I came from, I want to do this now. I can do this too.’”
The next workshop from Saint Primo will be on breaking into the film industry. Though details are not solidified for when and where yet, Rodriguez said that the organization plans to hold the event in Oak Cliff.
For more information on Saint Primo, visit the nonprofit’s Instagram page @st.primo.
