{"id":21672,"date":"2021-03-01T10:36:45","date_gmt":"2021-03-01T15:36:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.worldcatholicnews.com\/issa-lopezs-10-movies-for-womens-history-month\/"},"modified":"2021-03-01T10:36:45","modified_gmt":"2021-03-01T15:36:45","slug":"issa-lopezs-10-movies-for-womens-history-month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.worldcatholicnews.com\/issa-lopezs-10-movies-for-womens-history-month\/","title":{"rendered":"Issa L\u00f3pez\u2019s 10 Movies for Women\u2019s History Month"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(Photo by Vivien Killilea\/Getty Images for NALIP)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Director Issa L\u00f3pez roared into the genre scene with her film, Tigers Are Not Afraid<\/i>, in 2019. <\/i>The movie about children seeing ghosts and escaping supernaturally scary narcos captured the imagination of horror film festival audiences, leading to its eventual theatrical run and streaming release on Shudder and then to On Demand.<\/p>\n

But the path to get her passion project to audiences was not a short one. In fact, the little girl who grew up watching Andrei Tarkovsky and Steven Spielberg movies with her dad worked her way up in Mexico City\u2019s film industry, making a name for herself first as a romantic-comedy director. But with an undying love of monsters, ghouls, and other things that go bump in the night, L\u00f3pez made Tigers Are Not Afraid<\/i> against all odds.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, the risks have paid off. Now, the director is juggling multiple projects with collaborators she admires and has many more scares for audiences in mind. As part of our \u201cFilmmaker Selects\u201d series, L\u00f3pez spoke to Top Critic Monica Castillo<\/a> in-between busy writing sessions about her career trajectory, her upcoming projects, and some of the movies she recommends fans check out for Women\u2019s History Month.<\/p>\n\n

Monica Castillo for Rotten Tomatoes: <\/b>Tigers Are Not Afraid <\/i><\/b>is not your first movie, but it\u2019s the film you took the biggest chance on. How did that become the movie you decided to make a new name for yourself?
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Issa L\u00f3pez:<\/strong> As it happens with filmmaking, you have plans and you think things are going to turn one way, and they never ever, ever<\/em> work that way. So finally, because I had been successful for a long time with comedies, I had enough influence in the Mexican industry and enough respect as a director and as a writer to get into serious subject matter. And I was developing a very ambitious movie about the origins of the cartels during World War II, between Mexico and the US. And I was going to write and direct.<\/p>\n

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\"Tigeers<\/p>\n

Issa L\u00f3pez\u2019s Tigers Are Not Afraid<\/em>. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

And that, of course, fell apart horribly. Back then, I felt that it was the end of the world. I had invested five years [into the project]. It was my one hope to get away from only comedies. And I didn\u2019t know yet that you can\u2019t have one project or even two or three, you have to have more because they will stumble. So when these fell apart, I had nothing, and I was going through a horrendous breakup and my father had died recently. And I had to put my dog down. It was a mess. And the one thing that kept me sane was writing every day, because I didn\u2019t have time for more in trying to resuscitate this giant. I would have squeezed writing one scene of a movie for my sanity, and that was Tigers<\/i>. And eventually it came together and I looked at it and I realized I really had to make it. And I knew that it was going to be a very strange little animal \u2013 part horror, part political drama, part thriller, part fantasy, and investors and distributors hate movies that are part, part, part, part, part.<\/em> They hate them. But I knew I had to bring it into the world.<\/p>\n

What were some of your favorite moments on set?<\/b><\/p>\n

L\u00f3pez:<\/strong> There were so many of them. I was having a conversation a couple of days ago with my first AD, who is now a director in her own right and makes me incredibly happy. Her name is Hiromi Kamata, and she\u2019s the director of Selena: The Series<\/i>. I have to say that many of the best moments in that movie didn\u2019t come from my mind. They came from the mind of my team. I love to create an environment where you trust the people you\u2019ve called to this battle with you, and they come to you and they say, I have an idea of how this can work. And sometimes it doesn\u2019t, and sometimes, it\u2019s so much better than what you had in mind. So there\u2019s a lot of her mind in that movie, but we were talking about experience, and it\u2019s kind of extraordinary how in telling such a dark painful, scary story, we had such a great time. The kids were loving. It\u2019s incredible, because you see them suffering throughout the movie, and they were having a blast. They loved it so much that at the day\u2019s end, they came to me to pitch an idea for the sequel, because they just didn\u2019t want to stop making the movie. And I know they were enjoying it. One of my producers was saying that they had Stockholm Syndrome.<\/p>\n