i just launched a crowd funding campaign on Indiegogo for the latest film i wrote, PAWNSHOP DREAM. Its a follow up to my award winning feature film MACHETERO and it’s a surrealist comedy with its roots planted in the political soil of Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde and heavily influenced by the surreal Nuyorican poet and playwright Rev. Pedro Pietri. The film follows a teenage girl (played by Alexis “Flea” Fernandez) who sees a beautiful box of sand in a Pawnshop that she wants to buy. She goes in and asks the owner of the Pawnshop what it costs but the Pawnshop owner refuses to tell her. He only tells her what that she can’t afford it. The teenage girl really wants the box of sand, so the Pawnshop owner offer to put it on layaway and the teenage girl accepts putting down whatever money she has.
The Teenage girl returns to the Pawnshop several more times to make her layaway payments and each time the Pawnshop owner strings her along telling her she still doesn’t have enough to pay for the box of sand. Years pass and the teenage girl grows up to be a young woman who comes in and makes her layaway payment on the box of sand. More years pass and an older woman, (played by former US held Political Prisoner & Prisoner Of War Dylcia Pagan) comes in to finally claim what has always been rightfully hers. The Pawnshop owner refuses to give it to her telling her she won’t get the box of sand until she’s done paying for it and at the same time refusing to tell her what the final cost actually is.
The older woman comes back into the Pawnshop one last time with a beautifully wrapped box. She tells the Pawnshop owner that she has brought him a gift. The Pawnshop owner is thrilled at first until he hears a ticking noise coming from inside the pretty package. He asks the older woman what it is and she tells him it’s his time running out. She tells him that he has very little time to do the right thing but the Pawnshop owner insists on continuing to collect on the box of sand. Before he can tell the older woman to leave the Pawnshop the box stops ticking…
PAWNSHOP DREAM is all about simplifying the complex relationship between colonialism and capitalism. With a biting humor and a distilled political sense, the fog of understanding can be lifted to reveal the nakedness of the empire. With the occupation movements sweeping the US and around the world i think that the relationship between colonialism and capitalism is something that can be used to expose the empire. i think the beginnings of the rampant unchecked capitalism wrecking financial havoc around the world can be traced back to colonialism. i also think that the colonial situation of Puerto Rico is a metaphor for how capitalism treats each of us as individuals. It promises and promises and promises a better future if we work hard but never delivers on the promise.
Colonialism is a tool of capitalism and PAWNSHOP DREAM is a surrealist expose on the reality of that relationship. Colonialism and capitalism are historically intertwined. Although the film uses the “nationless nation” (as Rev. Pedro Pietri calls Puerto Rico) as an example of how capitalism uses colonialism to amass financial profits that metaphor can be applied to all the victims of capitalism… Each of us is colonized by capitalism’s false prophecy of prosperity…
We are trying to raise $5000 to make PAWNSHOP DREAM a reality… There are really only a few ways to help see this film come to fruition… Donate some loot… OR… Spread the love by spreading the word about the campaign to raise money for PAWNSHOP DREAM… If you are on twitter use the hashtag #PAWNSHOPDREAM… If you’re on Facebook post a link to the PAWNSHOP DREAM Indiegogo Campaign… If you have a blog and find the concept interesting write something about it or link this blog or reach out to Dylcia Pagan and or myself for an interview…
i can’t DIWO (Do It With Others) if there are no others to do it… i can’t DIWO, without you… Your help as always is a humbling endeavor for me and very, very, very much appreciated… For more info on the campaign and to follow our progress which will be updated frequently check out PAWNSHOP DREAM on Indiegogo…
The work on PAWNSHOP DREAM has already begun… Arturo & Joseph Rodriguez of RICANSTRUCTION got together a few weeks ago to record a part of the score at Terrordome Studios with DJ Johnny Juice of Public Enemy and X-Vandals at the controls. You can read all about it and check out a video of them recording the track from a previous post called Lunchroom Beats Vol. 1… Enjoy it.. It’s a lot of fun…
#nothingtobegainedhere 
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