Julio Chavezmontes is a Mexican film producer and screenwriter. In 2011, he founded Piano with Sebastián Hofmann to produce and distribute challenging and original films. Their feature debut, "Halley", premiered internationally at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, and was supported by the Hubert Bals Fund and Foprocine. Other well known productions include "Echo of the Mountain" and "We Are the Flesh". His work as a writer-producer has been profiled by Variety.
Career
2011 - Present: Notable Productions
Julio Chavezmontes started his career co-writing and producing "Halley", directed by Sebastian Hofmann, and co-produced by Mantarraya Producciones, the production company responsible for launching the careers of celebrated Mexican directors Carlos Reygadas and Amat Escalante. The film was sold to the Sundance / AMC Channel following its premiere at the New Frontier section of the Sundance Film Festival, and invited to over 50 international film festivals, including the prestigious Hivos Tiger Awards Competition of the IFF Rotterdam. Overall, "Halley" won 8 awards, including the Sitges New Visions Award, the Cinevision Award at Munich, the AQCC Award and the Special Jury Mention at Fantasia Film Festival. "Halley" was praised by Screen International, Rolling Stone Mexico, Indiewire, Letras Libres and Ion Cinema among others. Cultura Colectiva hailed the film as one of the 20 best cult Mexican films of the last 25 years, and was acclaimed by Chilango as one of the best new horror films from Mexico. Other notable productions include Nicolas Echevarría’s “Echo of the Mountain” and Emiliano Rocha Minter’s debut “We Are the Flesh”, which was publicly supported by Carlos Reygadas, Alejandro González Iñárritu and Alfonso Cuarón. Upon it commercial release in the United States, "We are the Flesh" was praised by the Village Voice, Slant Magazine, Los Angeles Times, and the SF Weekly among others. Julio Chavezmontes and Sebastian Hofmann co-wrote "Tiempo Compartido", their follow-up to "Halley", which was produced by Chavezmontes and directed by Hofmann. The film was supported by the Hubert Bals Fund, Cinemart, the Netherlands Film Fund, and EFICINE.
2014 - Present: Distribution
In 2014, Julio Chavezmontes partnered with Andrea Castex to launch distribution operations in Mexico, with a focus on author-driven cinema. Since then, the company has released Inori, Death in Arizona, Sand Dollars, The dead, Tropical Carmin, All of Me, Eisenstein in Guanajuato, The Pleasure is mine, Epitaph, We Are the Flesh, and The Darkness. In 2017, Piano announced an expansion of its acquisition strategy to foreign titles with the purchases of the 2017 Palme d'Or winner The Square, and Rungano Nyoni's feature film debut I'm not a Witch. Piano also launched for sale a DVD and Blu-ray collection of auteur cinema that includes so far three editions of Mexican cult movies, meticulously designed to offer a collection product to its public.
