Ángeles Cruz (born 1969) is a Mexican actress, film director, and screenwriter. As a filmmaker, she has focused on themes of ostracism, female sexuality, and gender violence. In a 2022 interview, she explained, "I have three imbalances: I come from an indigenous community, I am a woman, and I am a lesbian – things that have been stereotyped and placed in an emerging situation of survival."[1]
Her work has been recognized with three Ariel Awards.
Biography
Ángeles Cruz is originally from Villa Guadalupe Victoria in San Miguel el Grande [es], a mostly indigenous community high in the mountains of Oaxaca.[2][3] She grew up primarily speaking Spanish, but learned some Mixtec from her father.[4] In her community there was no electricity, no water, and no cinema. She saw only one film in her first sixteen years, El joven Juárez [es], which her father had in 16 mm.[1] "When I saw the film for the first time in a cinema, it changed me, transformed me; it totally pulled out the rug," she recalled.[5]
She wanted to be an agronomist and dedicate herself to farming, but her family had to relocate, first to Tlaxiaco, and later to Oaxaca. There, she switched to studying theater, a decision she credits to her high school teacher Sergio Santamaría.[6]
Cruz studied at the Miguel Cabrera Center of Artistic Education in Oaxaca, and later completed a licentiate in acting at the INBA Theater Art School in Mexico City.[7]
In the play El árbol (2016)
In 1994, she began getting roles in cinema. Her first film as an actress was the Swedish-Danish drama La hija del puma about massacres that occurred in Guatemala against the indigenous people.[1] Her performance was nominated for the Guldbagge Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role.[7]
In 2011, Cruz started writing her own stories, and directed a short film made from one such script, La tiricia o cómo curar la tristeza. It was produced by the Instituto Mexicano de Cinematografía, and won the Ariel Award for Best Short Film in 2013.[8]
She continued with the shorts La carta and Arcángel, followed by her first feature, Nudo Mixteco, starring Sonia Couoh [es] and Noé Hernández, which tells three stories of women living in indigenous communities in Oaxaca. Regarding the film's explicit love scenes between women, Cruz said,
Homosexuality has been crossed out in the world due to ignorance and due to this impasse that exists. For me it was important to name it and show it forcefully, not leave it to the imagination, not self-censor and let it remain in the line of imagination for the viewer to complete. I feel that it is a beautiful manifestation of love, and I feel that lesbian women in the communities have also remained in the dark, marginalized. Male homosexuality is named, everything from the male gaze. It seemed important to me to name it.[9]
^Ángeles Cruz estrena en Francia su película 'Nudo Mixteco' [Ángeles Cruz Premieres Her Film "Nudo Mixteco" in France] (in Spanish). RFI Español. 11 October 2021. Event occurs at 17:58. Retrieved 11 August 2023 – via YouTube. Mi comunidad Villa Guadalupe Victoria se rige por usos y costumbres. [My community Villa Guadalupe Victoria is governed by habits and customs.]
^Ángeles Cruz estrena en Francia su película 'Nudo Mixteco' [Ángeles Cruz Premieres Her Film "Nudo Mixteco" in France] (in Spanish). RFI Español. 11 October 2021. Event occurs at 5:35. Retrieved 11 August 2023 – via YouTube. Mi madre habla español y mi padre hablaba el mixteco y entonces sé algunas cosas de mixteco. Lo entiendo, lo hablo poco, pero si el mixteco digamos que es mi lengua paterna. [My mother speaks Spanish and my father spoke Mixtec, and so I know a few things in Mixtec. I understand it, I speak a little, but let's say Mixtec is my father tongue.]
^Ángeles Cruz estrena en Francia su película 'Nudo Mixteco' [Ángeles Cruz Premieres Her Film "Nudo Mixteco" in France] (in Spanish). RFI Español. 11 October 2021. Event occurs at 8:39. Retrieved 11 August 2023 – via YouTube. Cuando vi por primera vez la película en un cine, cambió, me transformó, me movió todo el tapete.
^Ángeles Cruz estrena en Francia su película 'Nudo Mixteco' [Ángeles Cruz Premieres Her Film "Nudo Mixteco" in France] (in Spanish). RFI Español. 11 October 2021. Event occurs at 2:46. Retrieved 11 August 2023 – via YouTube. Tuve la fortuna de llegar a la preparatoria en Mexico, primero a la ciudad de Oaxaca, y ahí un maestro que determinó digamos, que yo está aquí. Que es el maestro Sergio Santamaría, y qué decidió que tenía algo que hacer en el teatro. [I was fortunate to arrive at high school in Mexico, first in the city of Oaxaca, and there a teacher who determined, let's say, that I am here. That is the teacher Sergio Santamaría, and who decided that I had something to do in the theater.]
^Ángeles Cruz estrena en Francia su película 'Nudo Mixteco' [Ángeles Cruz Premieres Her Film "Nudo Mixteco" in France] (in Spanish). RFI Español. 11 October 2021. Event occurs at 23:25. Retrieved 11 August 2023 – via YouTube. La homosexualidad ha estado tachada en el mundo por ignorancia y por esta cerrazón que existe y para mi era importante nombrarlo y mostrarlo de manera contundente, no dejarlo a la imaginación, no autocensurarme y dejarlo que quede en la línea de la imaginación y que el espectador la complete. Siento que es una manifestación bellísima el amor y siento que también las mujeres lesbianas en las comunidades han permanecido en la oscuridad, marginadas. Se nombra la homosexualidad masculina, todo desde la mirada masculina, a mi me parecía importante nombrarlo.
.jpg)
