Yahoo News Pedro Costa to Host 2024 Creators Lab in Mexico’s Yucatán Jungle
Portuguese auteur Pedro Costa will host this year’s Creators Lab, organized and operated in Mexico by Playlab Films. The 2024 edition of the Lab will be held in Mexico, with a record 50 emerging filmmakers in attendance.
Pedro Costa Lab: Mexico will run from Sept. 23 to Oct. 3 at the Shambalanté, a space in the Yucatecan jungle curated by the Playlab Films team. According to its designers, the space uses “sacred geometry, ancient techniques, and modern eco-technology to achieve harmony across times, becoming a sanctuary of relaxation and healing.”
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For 12 days, participants will share meals, walks, and stream-of-consciousness conversations about their craft. Each will get the chance to make a short film with input and support from their peers. Ten of the shorts will be picked to receive full-color grading and distribution at international festivals. All on-site transportation, accommodations, meals, and activities are included in the Lab’s €6,100 ($6,600) fee.
Attendees of this year’s lab will also participate in group and individual activities with Costa, who will share tools, advice and experiences he acquired during his illustrious career, which includes competition screenings at Cannes, Venice and Locarno, as well as a pair of Portuguese Sophia Academy Award nominations.
According to the director, seen in the video below, he will be there to guide attendees through the “problems involved in making films. I will be there to guide you, to help you.”
Playlab is a global community of screen industry professionals headed by Estephania Bonnett. For ten years, the group has been organizing experiential workshops for emerging directors, working with filmmakers including Costa, Werner Herzog, Abbas Kiarostami and Apichatpong Weerasethakul, who hosted the last two years in the Peruvian Amazon jungle and the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico.
According to the Playlab team, “The idea of Creators Lab is to get out of our comfort zone, to face a strange and unknown territory, to observe it with curiosity and respect, to co-create from different ways of seeing and understanding the world.”
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