Acclaimed Mexican editor-turned-director Natalia López Gallardo, whose directorial debut feature “Robe of Gems” won the Silver Bear Jury Prize at the Berlinale in 2022, is currently developing her second feature, “Only Love Exists.” The contemporary drama about intertwining digital and real lives will pitch in the Europe-Latin America Co-Production Forum at this year’s San Sebastian Film Festival.
“Only Love Exists” is the story of Teresa, a medical assistant who cares for patients in her work and engages with the fears and desires of others on the internet. Over time, the virtual world starts to encroach into her real life as Teresa indulges more and more in her own desires somewhere on the border of the two dimensions.
After a brush with death, Teresa becomes more acutely aware of the physical world around her, where beauty and oppression coexist, the synopsis says. Through the act of caring for a friend, Teresa begins a journey of salvation.
López also wrote the film’s screenplay and will produce alongside her “Robe of Gems” producer Fernanda de la Peza (“The Untamed,” “The Hole in the Fence”. Co-producers include Marie-Pierre Macia and Sacha Ben Haroche.
“The strongest impression I had upon reading the first treatment of ‘Only Love Exists’ was the feeling of being present, inhabiting today’s world,” producer Fernanda de la Peza told Variety. “A narrative of great originality that places a character with a profession as old as humanity itself, now embedded with technological capitalism without having established a new framework of valuation (moral and legal). ‘Only Love Exists’ aims to harness the power of cinema to explore, express, and exalt the complexity of the human soul.”
Mexico’s Cárcava Cine, de la Peza’s label, and Lobo en Medio de Lobos are producing, with France’s MPM Premium and NousNous in the U.S. co-producing. Shooting is scheduled for fall 2025.
Founded in Mexico City in 2018, Cárcava is dedicated to showcasing auteur and independent filmmaking. In addition to López’s “Robe of Gems,” the company has found tremendous festival and awards success with films such as “Lost in the Night,” from Amat Escalante, a Venice best director winner and three-time Mexican Academy nominee and Joaquin del Paso’s Venice Horizons player “The Hole in the Fence.”
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