A CENTURY OF COCKTAIL HISTORY
Our main objective with this film is to highlight the contributions of Hispanics to the world cocktail industry. The role of these professionals helped in the beginning to develop techniques, recipes and ethical values of the bartender as a professional. Many of these individuals left a very important legacy for the new generations, a legacy that remains in force and will remain if the industry exists. Being able to tell this story would give us the opportunity to learn from their perspective the history and evolution of cocktails worldwide. The influence of Hispanic professionals in a certain way has enriched the training of many bartenders of today.
We will be able to portrait the history of cocktails recipes, ingredients (products, distillery) or elements that change the world of cocktails forever. We are programming a series of interview with a panel of world renowned of experts in the industry to give their opinions and perspectives from their point of view.
In 1806, the Catalan entrepreneurs, Pedro Font and Francisco Juncadella, built in New Orleans a building to be used as tenement and as a warehouse for the groceries they imported from Spain, such as Jerez finos or Prieorat red wines. Not long after, in 1815, Aleix, Miss Juncadella’s nephew, renewed the ground floor in a cafe, which he called Aleix Cofee House. Was at this cafe, in 1874, where Cayetano Ferrer, a Catalan barman, created ‘The absinthe Frappe’ a new cocktail, that became that popular that drove onto changing the name of the premises to ‘The Absinthe House’. this bar is still open with an extended name: ‘The old Absinthe House’ and it still offers the same cocktail created in the United States by a Hispanic barman in the XIX century.
From these first experiments with spirits, to the contributions made by illustrious Spanish bartenders such as Perico Chicote or Miguel Boadas, or his contemporary on the other side of the ocean, maestro Pichin in Argentina, Joaquin Grau in Venezuela, the cocktail has been and is a living metaphor of the extraordinary mixture of cultures between the old continent and America. The American dry law (1919-1933) propelled the development of these incipient and influential mixologists who laid a legacy that still continues today.
It’s said that the history of the cocktail bar has been written on the bar counters, hence the reason the data is never entirely accurate. Nevertheless, with this project we aim to provide value, color, and rigor to that memory forgotten of the mythical bartenders that seeded its influence in Latin America, while we will see the current bartenders revolutionizing the landscape of the cocktail bar with fresh and daring combinations with the best from America and Spain
The purpose is to get the history of the cocktail bar to a wide audience. To do this, we aim to expose a dynamic narration which will be mixing parallel different lines of argument.
On one hand we will expose a historical development that will go guided through the statements of experts, historians, some of the main characters’ relatives, bartenders and the liquor sector’s entrepreneurs, which will provide the objective information and unique anecdotes along the plot. In this way we will be able to visit some of the key places of this story, like the Cuban Floridita, Chicote Museum in Madrid, the Boadas in Barcelona, Joaquin Grau in Venezuela or Pichin in Buenos Aires, among another locations.
In this documentary film, various audiovisual styles converge, forming a piece rich in color and nuances, which will make it possible to bring the history of cocktails closer to the viewer, and at the same time that will enjoy a really attractive visual proposal.
The main purpose is to assemble a speech built from the statements of the selected characters. Reason why we will carry out interviews showing their own working environments, using appropriate lighting, fixed shot, using a tripod or, in case of showing the premises we will be using the stabilizers.
Assembling all the materials will be very exciting, which shocking cuts that will help to maintain the dramatic tension in the course of the scenes, being able rely on suggestive file image that will bring a different attribute to the film.
During this shots, the photography will be focused in the work of making the cocktail, using super slow cameras to further enhance the details of the process with short focal lengths, highlighting the textures and colors of the cocktail that is being made. The aim is to give really precious moments.
With regards to the audio, we will have the answers of the interviewees who will be embedded into the image. We will have direct sound of recorded environments in the different scenes, enhancing sound details of the moment if necessary. At the same time an original soundtrack will be created for the film
Jorge Peña Martin
www.jorgepemar.com
Born in Malaga in 1978. Graduate in Audiovisual Communication by the University SEK Segovia. He finishes his studies at the ‘Cine and Television’ school of San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba, specialized on script and also at Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona, where he studied a master on audiovisual communication and publicity content. His experience in this field is very wide, he has worked as scriptwriter, director, producer and post producer, working for TV, brads or institutions, also working on video installations for museums or expositions. His authorship has developed mainly on a ‘no fiction’ field, participating and being awarded on several festival and competitions.
Director:
Executive Director:
Francisco Guitard and Cesar Diaz
Production:
Instituto Nauta and Cocktail Capital, LLC
Projection:
Hispanic Film Festival, St Augustine, Florida
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