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Dora has been Officially Selected, under best Short Narrative, by the Rhode Island International Film Festival (RIIFF), in its 26TH edition, progressing to Semi-Finalist.

The RIIFF is considered one of the most highly regarded international film festivals in the United States and is a qualifying festival for Best Short Subject through the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. The RIIFF is also a festival known for celebrates the independent spirit in film.

RIIFF takes place every year in Providence and Newport, Rhode Island as well as satellite locations throughout the state.

The intersectionality of the harsh inequities of life as an immigrant in the US, when met with the ultimate catalyst—the Covid19 pandemic—is the setting of Dora, the timelines of star-crossed lovers stories, by composer and visual artist Julián De La Chica. Brilliantly incorporating selections from his recent album, Silencios Fatuos Op. 16, De La Chica lets the deeply nuanced music speak for itself and the role that isolation plays in this 30-minute snapshot of love and sexuality, loss and despair.

Dora follows the journeys of a Latina immigrant and her trans roommate/lover in Queens, New York, and how the pandemic shattered their already precarious stances. The film draws inspiration from De La Chica’s Latinx and queer identities, giving unique voice to many of those whose vulnerabilities as minorities are often overlooked.

“… both an artistic triumph and an emotional story at its heart. Julián De La Chica has made a potent film, one that works on several levels simultaneously. Visually poignant, thematically relevant and artistically creative, Dora is a winner.”

— The Falcon International Film Festival

Dora is an important perspective into the lives of "others" — those deemed as such by the privileged—and how the perception of otherness was more starkly brought to light in the pandemic. De La Chica's debut film, Agatha, released in 2020, received remarkable critical acclaim, earning accolades at nearly three dozen international film festivals.

Dora has been featured and received awards in various additional festivals, such as the Rome International Film Festival, Indiefest Film Awards, FIFF London Awards, the Vesuvius International Film Festival, London Short Film Festival, and the Florence Film Awards. It has also been featured and recognised at independent film festivals in Sweden, New York, Chicago, Madrid, Barcelona, Toronto and Berlin.

Cast:

Carolina Aponte as Dora
Ernesto Linnemann as Ernestina
Rocco Ancarola as Stefano
& the Special Appearance of Ramiro Meneses as Federico

Official Trailer

Synopsis:

Dora, a young, aspiring hairdresser from Colombia living in Queens is suddenly faced with the grim uncertainties of the pandemic’s epicenter. Together with her trans lover Ernestina, Dora seeks a means of survival in a city that continuously overlooks its most vulnerable residents. The pandemic embraces the two women, alone together, in Ernestina’s apartment, while they look out their window and realize that their dreams of a city that never sleeps have been quieted by a new, deafening stillness.