| Print |

How does the anthropological approach of the CSPC affect a cinematic project?

 

We think that all anthropological approaches bring the following to projects:

  1. An internal cohesion of the stories at a structural anthropological level.
  2. Consistency with reality by giving structure to characters and stories, given that it depicts characters in greater detail than a phenomena-based approach.
  3. It gives a clearer understanding of the authors´ proposal.
  4. An examination of the meaning of life. 

 

How does the spiritual anthropological approach of the CSPC affect a cinematic project?

 

Basically it brings special elements and criteria for discovering dimensions and situations in human life that represent the meaning of life, the dilemma between absurdity and happiness. For example: The personal dimension, the opening of the Transcendent, the consistency of liberty in relation to the meaning of life, the actual possibility of knowing truth, pain, and death, the dynamic force of love, the force of sexual identity, the place of human passions in the road to freedom, the actual possibility of loving and being happy as a cause of hope, the meaning of history, etc. .

 

Is this anthropological approach just a way of hiding your intention to make religious cinema?

 

The CSPC neither reduces stories to a religious genre level, nor impedes this. The CSPC admits that the basic structure of its language is a vision of the male and female being as a reality open to God, capable of finding him/herself with God. This does not imply that the stories produced have to deal purely with religious or moral plots, although these plots form a structural part of human beings and condition the path of their lives, by affirming or negating openness to the Transcendent. 

 

In other words, we do not want to negate the fact that man is naturally and historically religious. To arrive at a filmic description of this anthropology, we want to do it from inside an experience and concrete expression of faith.

 

We want to travel into the heart of man without trivializing the consistency of diverse religious identities. We believe as film makers that the best way we can respect and help interreligious dialogue is through seeking cinematographic languages that narrate the ineffable. We don’t want narrate the ineffable in a homogenous or uniform way as if history and freedom had no influence on lives. We want to go into detail and describe the very Christian, spiritual, anthropological identity, seeking in it the questions and answers to common and universal debate about the meaning of human existence and the desire for happiness. On this voyage, we want to invite all those, Catholic or not, who want to join this search, to help us on this expedition.

 

We are not hiding the type of structural anthropology, nor limiting ourselves to the religious cinema genre.

 

Is there any censorship?

 

Yes.  Two rules:

  1. We do not use cinema as ideological propaganda for any political party.

  2. We are not looking for highly erotic images.

 

Do the film makers of the CSPC have to believe in God?

Not necessarily.  To join the CSPC you merely have to accept, know and explore Christian anthropology as a function of the development of new cinematographic languages, even though this anthropology is not professed as a religious creed.

 

Who are the “Specialists”?

 

The film makers who attend the CSPC for two years. Given that they have completed their university degrees, they have produced audiovisual material and are dedicated to the development of new languages, we have omitted the word student, opting instead for Specialists which better describes the dynamicism of those attending the center.

 

Who are we?

 

The CSPC is made up of: The Specialists, the Teaching Body, the Board, the Counsel of Guarantees of the CSPC along with the Pontifical Council for Culture, the Ente dello Spettacolo and Signis.

 

What do we do?

 

  • We produce new cinematographic languages with the unmistakable trait of reading and narrating reality using a transcendental anthropological perspective.

  • We seek to narrate the ineffable in human reality without focusing on a fixed genre.

  • We aim to produce cutting-edge projects which use cinema to capture the spiritual dimension of human life.

  • We try to discover if it is possible to glimpse a truly happy and attainable destiny in human drama.

  • We want to read historical reality, as a rich dimension of meaning and hope.

  • We seek to formulate a language capable of provoking existential questions, which lets us investigate the origin and destiny of our deepest desires.

  • We seek to make cinema which expresses the cultural identity of our local origins as biggest contribution to a moment of global encounter.

  • We want to project and give voice to the cry of pain of so many stories hidden for banal reasons under the garments of indifference and the absurd.

 

WHY JOIN THE CSPC?

 

We put forth three reasons:

  1. To be eligible to enter the competition for a feature length movie which the CSPC offers its specialists at the end of the two years of training.

  2. To hone and develop practically your intuitions about new cinematographic languages.

  3. To experience producing cinema from a spiritually Christian anthropological perspective.

 

Where did we start?

 

After several years of intensive planning, the CSPC originated in the city of Guadalajara, Mexico with an office in Rome, Italy.
 
Latest News