With a soundtrack recorded by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra in Wellington and sound engineer John Neill of Peter Jackson’s Park Road Studio serving as recording producer and score mixer, Latin America’s first multi-million dollar science fiction horror movie “Pacific,” is set to make a splash when it bows next year.
Producer Mauricio Brunetti estimates the final production cost for “Pacific,” now in post for its multiple visual effects, will reach up to $10 million and if all goes well, it may even have its world premiere in New Zealand.
The Colombian-Argentine co-production is the directorial debut of visual effects supervisor Gonzalo Gutierrez who has worked on such films as “XYZ” and on the original Argentine and Colombian versions of hit romantic comedy “Lion’s Heart” (“Corazon de Leon”).
“Pacific” is a reunion of sorts for Gutierrez, Brunetti and the leads of the Colombian “Lion’s Heart,” Manolo Cardona and Maria Nela Sinisterra. It dips into ancient South American lore as it turns on a group of young travelers who are stranded on a Pacific island where they face an alien presence kept secret by the natives for centuries.
It stars an ensemble pan-Latin cast that includes Mexican thesps Ricardo Abarca (“Que Culpa Tiene el Niño”) and Christopher von Uckermann (“Kdabra”); Venezuelan actress-singer Maria Gabriela de Faria (“IsaTKM”) and Colombia’s Claudio Cataño (“2091”).
Funded by Colombian film entity Proimagenes, Argentine film institute Incaa, and produced by Brunetti’s Sinema and Patagonia Films, “Pacific” was shot on location in the Colombian capital of Bogota as well as Colombia’s coastal region of Choco and its jungles along the Pacific coast.
Brunetti, who co-wrote and directed 2015 Argentine supernatural period drama “The Innocents,” has also recently produced Angola-set documentary “Andres,” directed by Javier Sanchez Carreño.
“We are presenting a cut to the Pope to see if we could get him on camera to comment on the subject matter,” said Brunetti.
“Andres” revolves around Brunetti’s elementary school teacher who has been teaching music in Angola for three decades.