"An engaging, unorthodox and gripping crime tale which leaves its mark" Keri O'Shea, Warped Perspective

"Faceless tales that smack you in your face" Jo Phillips, .Cent Magazine

"An insight like you've never seen before" Dan Bullock, Critical Popcorn

“Shows a Mexican documentary filmmaker at his best” The Film Verdict

“Manages to chill and enthral more than many straightforward documentaries on the subject” The GATE

Sovereign is proud to announce the release of the searing and important documentary A WOLFPACK CALLED ERNESTO on digital platforms from 13th May 2024.

Everardo González, director of the 2017 documentary Devil’s Freedom, about the Mexican drug war (winner of 2017 Winner Amnesty International Film Prize at the Berlin International Film Festival), returns the subject of crime and criminals in A WOLFPACK CALLED ERNESTO, this time focusing on how the cycle of gun violence affects Mexican children.

The innovative filming technique - using iPhones attached to the various subjects’ backs with a scorpion tail harness - gives the film a raw, intimate energy similar to Gasper Noe’s Enter The Void, and offers a glimpse into a rarely-seen underworld that has been too long ignored.

Intense and revelatory, A WOLFPACK CALLED ERNESTO is a truly important and remarkable film - underscored with a pulsating electronic soundtrack - a wake-up call to the staggering violence that leaves one person dead by firearms every 41 minutes. The film received its World Premiere at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival.

Everardo González is considered as one of the strongest voices in the documentary genre in Latin America. His filmography includes Pulque Song (2003), The Old Thieves (2007), The Open Sky (2011), Drought (2011) El Paso (2015), and Devil’s Freedom (2017), all screened and awarded at various festivals like Berlin, IDFA, Toulouse, Locarno, Montreal, BAFICI, Sarajevo, Guadalajara and Morelia. Everardo is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Academia Mexicana de Artes y Ciencias Cinematográficas. He is also the founder of the Mexican Documentary Net which looks for social, political and cultural impact for bringing documentary filmmakers better conditions for the future.

SYNOPSIS
In Mexico, 350,000 people have been killed over the last 15 years by armed criminals - 30,000 were under 18. The film follows the paths of the youths collectively named ‘Ernesto’ - victims as well as killers - who in a certain moment of their lives had access to a gun, used it to kill, and soon became an inextricable part of a crime organisation.

A WOLFPACK CALLED ERNESTO will be available on Google, Sky, Microsoft, Virgin, Apple TV+, iTunes, Amazon, Curzon Home Player and Sovereign's Vimeo from 13th May 2024

A WOLFPACK CALLED ERNESTO: FESTIVAL SCREENINGS
A Wolfpack Called Ernesto had its World Premiere, in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition, at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival; and has been shown at the 2023 Guadalajara International Film Festival, where it won the MEZCAL Award Special Jury Prize, and was nominated for Best Mexican Film; the 2023 Bergen International Film Festival, where it was nominated for Documentaire Extraordinaire; the 2023 Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, where it was nominated for Best International Documentary; and the Morelia International Film Festival, where it was nominated in for the Documentary Film Competition Award

ABOUT SOVEREIGN
Sovereign releases auteur-driven feature films in the UK, from emerging and established international talent. Our carefully curated titles have played to strong critical and audience acclaim, often premiering at renowned international film festivals, including Cannes, Berlinale, Toronto, Venice and many more.

Previously acquired titles include Peru’s entry into the Oscars Song Without A Name, which screened in the Directors’ Fortnight section at the 72nd Cannes Film Festival; Philippine crime drama Verdict, which received the Special Orizzonti Jury Prize at the 76th Venice Film Festival; historical drama Malmkrog, which won Best Director in the Encounter section and opened the 70th Berlin Film Festival; Argentinian psychological thriller A Common Crime, which received its world premiere at the 70th Berlin Film Festival; Bad Luck Banging Or Loony Porn, which won the Golden Bear at the 2021 Berlin International Film Festival; and Kirill Serebrennikov’s Petrov’s Flu, winner of the prestigious CTS Artist award at last year’s Cannes Film festival, and also nominated for the Palme d’Or; Memoria, from Palme d’Or winner Apichatpong Weerasethakul, starring Tilda Swinton, which won the Cannes Jury Prize in 2021; Bolivian director Kiro Russo’s The Great Movement, winner of the Special Jury Prize in the Horizons strand at the 2021 Venice Film Festival; Ruben Östlund’s Triangle of Sadness, starring Woody Harrelson, which won the Palme d’Or at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival; Bent Hamer’s award-winning The Middle Man starring Pål Sverre Hagen and Paul Gross; Francisca Alegría’s The Cow Who Sang a Song Into the Future, which was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival; the thriller Inside, from writer/director Vasilis Katsoupis and starring Willem Dafoe; Laurent Nègre’s World War two drama A Forgotten Man, starring Michael Neueschwander as a Swiss diplomat; and Kirill Serebrennikov’s astonishing biopic Tchaikovsky’s Wife; and Lisandro Alonso’s Eureka, starring Viggo Mortensen.

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