La Sister: “Film Is About Bringing Fantasy and Reality Together”

Of all the freedoms which have been taken away from us by the pandemic, the loss of travel has perhaps been the most suffocating. The joy of discovering somewhere new, seeing the world from a new angle, and adding valuable experiences to your memory bank has long been an effective fuel for creativity. 

It’s hard to imagine someone who understands the importance of new experiences quite like La Sister. The director, recently signed to branded entertainment production company Gloria Content, could draw a line from Belgium to Mexico City and cross over a multitude of places she calls home. The cultural influences and human understanding can be seen running through her work - whether it be the innate humanity of ‘We Are All The Same’, or the higher ideals explored in ‘Cosmos’. 

To understand the unique director’s process and approach to filmmaking, as well as look back on her standout work so far, LBB spoke to La Sister.

Above: La Sister’s ‘We Are All The Same’ touches on our inner humanity, a theme which can be seen in much of the director’s work. 

Culture and Creativity

“Living in Baja California, near San Diego, was like growing up in two different countries at the same time”, reflects La Sister. “We were right on the border between the US and Mexico. You had two different cultures flowing into each other”.

It was in that place, at the intersection of different cultures, where La Sister was first inspired to pursue a career in film. “I can remember very vividly a couple of classes where the teacher instructed us to close our eyes and imagine pictures accompanying music he would play”, she says. “Every time it happened, my hand was up in the air and I wanted to share what was going through my mind! It was a thrill to visualise those kinds of abstract feelings and emotions”.

For La Sister, the cultural duality of her home has always bled into her creativity. “After I finished school, I moved to Belgium, where I learned French. Then I came back to Mexico City, which had more deeply ingrained Mexican values than Baja”, she explains. “Following that, I spent three years in film school at Barcelona. Then to Paris for a year, then back to Mexico City, and finally Barcelona again where I live now”. 

It was partly that jet-setting lifestyle that first afforded La Sister the inspiration to explore her craft. “I find travel very helpful for the writing side of things”, she says. “By which I mean the physical act of travelling. It’s easy for me to write on a train, or in a car, where I can see the world flashing past”.

Emotive Filmmaking

For La Sister, filmmaking has always been about communicating a certain truth. “The pain or happiness you feel inside - that is reality”, she says. “So film is an opportunity to express that reality in a visual way. That’s what makes it special - there’s nowhere else in the world you can do this. In that sense, film is about bringing what’s in your mind into the real world. It’s bringing fantasy and reality together”.

Looking back through the director’s work, it’s not difficult to see that philosophy born out. Cosmos, a story of two reincarnated souls trying to find themselves in a new life, is an illustrative example. 

“The whole process of making Cosmos was such a whirlwind”, says La Sister. “From writing to filming, it took around one week. I was writing on a Monday and shooting the following weekend. So I spent that whole week in a kind of cocoon with the project, living and breathing it. I had no idea of the reception it would get once it was released!”

Above: Following the release of Cosmos, La Sister picked up an award for Best Emerging Talent at the London Fashion film festival 2020, alongside many other awards for the film.

Following the events of the past year, La Sister’s desire to explore deep-seated emotion and truth through film could be more important than ever before. “I think there are many things which have happened in the past 15 months, in terms of the pandemic and lockdowns, from which there is no turning back”, she says. “For example, look at the way brands communicate. There’s an understanding that you can’t be superficial, you have to be rooted in authenticity. It’s a positive thing - it makes me hopeful for the future as we build back from this past year”.

In such an environment, perhaps La Sister’s knack for incorporating human truth into storytelling has found its ideal home.