2017/narrative/12 min.
A fire rages in the woods near a village. The fire triggers a memory in a lonely woman. And this memory pushes her to utter aloud the words she's always wanted to say.
Produced in Cuba with the support of Black Factory Cinema and Escuela Internacionales de Cine y Tv in San Antonio de los Banos (EICTV), and made under the guidance of master filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. The result of Mosley's selection as a participant in the 2016 Workshop for Auteurs, the film examines grief, transference, and the consequences of role-playing.
Mosley contributed an essay about the making of the film on This Long Century, musing how his own tenuous recollections of the shoot mirrored the protagonist’s fractured memories in the film.
Starring Carmen Rodriguez, Nilda Diaz, and Christian Jaime.
Now streaming on Hammer to Nail, Vimeo, and Kinoscope.
SCREENINGS/PRIZES:
-WINNER: Summer 2016 HAMMER TO NAIL Short Film Contest
-2017 Champs-Elysees Film Festival (World Premiere- U.S. short film competition)
-2017 Marfa Film Festival (U.S. Premiere)
-2017 Adirondack Film Festival, NY
-2017 DePaul University Showcase Screening (Champs-Elysees tour), Chicago, IL
-2017 St. Cloud Film Festival, MN
-2017 Dallas VideoFest (The Texas Show)
-2018 Anthology Film Archives (NewFilmmakers NY)
-2018 Dallas International Film Festival (Narrative Shorts Competition)
-2018 The Spectacle Theater, NYC
PRESS:
"A quiet gem. Questions evolve slowly and masterfully over a tightly compacted 12 minutes." -Don R. Lewis, HAMMER TO NAIL
“Mosley proves himself to be a master of lending seemingly mundane details and objects a sense of grandeur and symbolic import — a stream of billowing smoke from a bonfire, a cup of melting ice cream, a tattered football used by the village children. These elements work together to create a rich tapestry of emotionally forceful images, delving into the slippery nature of identity, the way memory is triggered by innocuous objects, and the minor events of childhood that seem, in retrospect, to hold great import. This level of attention paid to communicating theme and emotion through form alone is rare to find in both contemporary mainstream and arthouse cinema, and establishes Mosley as a major cinematic voice.” -James Slaymaker, VAGUE VISAGES
“Casa De Mi Madre explores the relationship of a mother and her son, fuelled by a fire that triggers latent and disturbing memories. Carmen Rodriguez, playing the mother, displays a palette of emotions, ranging from fiery to sympathetic, her performance phenomenally praise-worthy under the immediate direction of Frank.” -Alexa Modugno, FRONTRUNNER MAGAZINE
"One of the best 50 films of 2018. A simple, yet affecting short. Akin to a coming-of-age story...and yet settling into a more profound facet of deep, fundamental change." - Kevin Rakestraw, FILM PULSE
"Given the simplicity of the film’s handful of shots, it is impressive that Mosley has ambitiously attempted to cram so much meaning into them. The story offers impressionistic brushstrokes of anguish." -Peter Simek, D MAGAZINE
“Those notes, taken during a workshop in Cuba, are Frank Mosley’s contribution to This Long Century, which has also recently posted offerings from Jodie Mack and Sky Hopinka.” -David Hudson, THE CRITERION CURRENT
“Lucid dreaming. Alchemy. These are two unlikely explanations to consider for what I’m still not sure ever could have happened. As one of 52 filmmakers invited to participate in the Taller de filmando en Cuba con Abbas Kiarostami, I am not alone in describing the workshop as being similar to a somnambulistic experience.” -Cameron Bruce Nelson, FILMMAKER MAGAZINE