10/15/2026
It was a full house this week as we hosted our second Brown Bag lecture of the semester with Mónica García- Blizzard.
Her talk about neorealism compared two films about the struggles of fishing villages in Italy and Mexico.
In the Mexican Secretary of Education funded film, "Redes" (1936), called "The Wave" in English, we see the struggle of poor, mexican fishermen in Alvarado off the coast of the Gulf of Mexico as they attempt to overcome exploitation.
In "Terra Trema" (1948), with the English title. "The Earth Trembles," follows the Valastro family as they face similar dynamics of violence as their family's fishing operation is pushed out by Wholesalers.
Both films use largely non-professional actors to create the documentary feeling of neorealism. And both deal with themes that humanized individual experiences in the wake of a capitalist system that views the human as disposable.
Mónica García-Blizzard uses the frameworks of attentive viewing, which she defined as a "just and loving gaze," to compare the two films and the hope or despair that they elicit in their audience.
Thank you, gracias, and grazie to Mónica for her lecture! We can't wait to read more!
