The Inheritors

Los herederos

Eugenio Polgovsky

Mexico

2008

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Description

Children raised in the Mexican countryside start working at an early age. The Inheritors is a portrait of their lives and their daily struggle for survival. They have a wide range of activities: they are farmers and shepherds; they walk long distances to cut firewood; they weave; they make bricks; they care for their younger siblings; they migrate with their families to work the harvests; they carry water; they carve and paint wood to make alebrije figures. Inheriting the tools and techniques of their ancestors means these children also inherit their misery. Generation after generation mired in a circle of inherited poverty.

Awards and festivals

- La Rochelle Film Festival. France (2011)
- International Film Festival Rotterdam. Netherlands (2009)
- GeBerlin International Film Festival. Germany (2009)
- Thessaloniki Documentary Festival. Greece (2009)
- Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema. Argentina (2009)
- Vancouver International Film Festival. Canada (2009)
- AFI Film Festival. USA (2009)
- Punto de Vista. International Documentary Film Festival. Spain (2009)
- Venice Film Festival. Italy (2008)

Biography of the director

Eugenio Polgovsky Ezcurra (Mexico City, 1977). Director, editor and cinematographer. His career began as a self-taught photographer on various trips he took around Mexico and throughout the world. At the age of 17, he won the ACCU / Unesco photography prize in Japan. He later studied at the Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica in Mexico City.

In 2004 he made Trópico de Cáncer (Tropic of Cancer), a naturalistic portrait of how the inhabitants of the San Luis Potosí desert struggle to survive. The film earned various awards (Joris Ivens Prize at the Cinéma du Reél International Documentary Festival, Ariel Award from the Mexican Academy of Arts and Cinematographic Sciences, Eye Award at the FIC Morelia 2004, Best Documentary at FICCO, among others), and participated in the Critics' Week at Cannes. In 2007 he founded Tecolote Films and, along with the Hubert Bals Fund and Visions Sud Est, he produced Los Herederos (The Inheritors), a portrait of Mexican peasant children filmed in 8 regions of Mexico. It premiered at the Venice Film Festival, participated in the official section of the Berlin Film Festival and was selected to the Bright Future section in Rotterdam, in addition to earning critical acclaim and winning numerous awards. Polgovsky was invited to lead the Robert Flaherty seminar in 2010 and has garnered over 30 international awards in the categories of editing, photography and directing.

Mitote (Mexican Ritual) (2012) premiered at the Rome Film Festival and won the Ariel Award for Best Documentary Film, while the film Resurrección (Resurrection) (2016) participated in several international festivals, including Cinéma du Réel and the Morelia International Film.