The Location Managers Guild International (LMGI) is the largest organization of Location Managers and Location Scouts in the motion picture, television, commercial and print production industries. Their membership plays a vital role in the creativ
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LMGI COMPASS | Spring 2019 • 29 building would not fall while we were working inside it. Alfonso very much liked that it was a real building from that time. Also, he liked the fact that his father had worked in that medical complex. It was challenging to find the right beach. In Alfonso's memory, the beach should be in Veracruz, and that area of the country has very particular beach characteristics. It had to be a beach where there should not be many people or cars. The sand and waters had to be very similar to Veracruz beaches. Finally, we found it in Tabasco, which is on the Gulf of Mexico. EC: Classic beaches in Mexico are tropical paradises, but we want- ed to have a nontropical sad beach—not that cheerful. It was a sad moment for the family. The mother had to tell the children that their father was not coming back. HR: Another challenge was to find an area where we could build the main streets of Insurgentes Avenue and the Las Americas Cinema. It was for the scene where Alfonso's family sees the father leave the cinema. Mexico City is a very saturated place with more than 20 million people, and it is very complicated to find free spaces to be able to build sets of this magnitude. We relied on new technologies and Google Earth to find interest- ing spaces. We found a space that belonged to the federal govern- ment where Eugenio was able to build all those streets. EC: Alfonso wanted to shoot in some places where it was not possible. We couldn't film on Insurgentes Avenue, where they cross to go to Las Americas Cinema, and the avenue where the mother crashes the car between two trucks. We built these two avenue sets from scratch on a large site. HR: The rooftop was also a very special location, with very particu- lar views that Alfonso wanted. I asked a collaborator on my team to look for rooftops in houses in the oldest neighborhoods of the city. He took about three months to search and photograph an endless number of rooftops, until Alfonso was comfortable. EC: For the rooftop, Horacio provided more than 100 options. We ended up with one that we modified, but it was very good. HR: Finding the location for the Corpus Christi Massacre was not difficult. We filmed it in the historical place where the repression happened. Alfonso was very clear that he wanted to film some things that really happened in those times of his childhood in the actual places. NM: How did you get into location work? HR: After finishing college in 1994, I tried to study film in Los Angeles. I got there but I realized that my financial situation was not going to allow me to study film in the United States. From Los Ange- les, I traveled to San Diego, and I worked on different things for a few months. Then I went to Tijuana, working as a host at the Hard Rock Cafe. That's where I learned about Fox Studios in Rosarito, which was very popular because they had just finished Titanic. On a day off, I decided to go to the studios and knock on the door so I could also start working there. When I arrived, there were no more projects, but I made good friends with the guards at the main entrance. They were the ones who let me know when projects were coming. One day, they told me that a new project was going to start. I went the first day they started hiring staff with my CV under my arm. Producer Rafael Cuervo was the one who gave me my first opportunity to go to work at a professional film studio. The first project that gave me the opportunity to work as a loca- tion assistant was In Dreams, directed by Neil Jordan. It was three months of work and two weeks of shooting. I continued working at Fox Studios. My second project was Deep Blue Sea, directed by Renny Harlin. After that, producer Rafael Cuervo, with whom I worked on those two projects, invited me to work on other mov- ies in Mexico. Between 1999 and 2017, I met other producers who invited me to different projects—Y Tu Mamá También, Collateral Damage, Apocalypto, The Legend of Zorro, Fast & Furious (Mexico unit) and Terrence Malick's Song to Song (Mexico unit). NM: What do you love about your job? HR: The variety of the work. From 1997, when I started on In Dreams, to today, I've worked in medium- and high-impact proj- ects, national films, foreign films, American films and European films. I have the great fortune of having met more producers, with whom I work and with whom I have maintained good friendships. THE ROMA LOCATION TEAM: Horacio Rodriguez, LMGI, Location Manager Claudia Puebla, Location Manager Fabiola Maldonado, Location Coordinator Viridiana Torres, Location Coordinator, set "Halconazo" Isaias Galicia, Location Manager Assistant Felipe Medina, Alejandra Fonseca, Location Assistants Ruben Garay, Carlos Anguiano, Juan Lugo, Igor Rechy, Location Scouts Natalia Herrera, Armando "El Toca" Ramírez, Location Assistants Marco Vinicio Guillén, Alejandro Uriegas, Diana Altamirano, Location Assistants, set "Halconazo" Lizeth Monge, Location Assistant tt