Love story documentary is Panama official submission to Oscars
Posted by Elena del Valle on November 13, 2024
This article was created without AI-assisted technologies.
Tito, Margot and Me
Image: IndiePix Films
Tito, Margot and Me, a 92-minute 2021 documentary, in Spanish and English with English subtitles (the screener version provided was in Spanish and English without subtitles), is Panama’s official Oscar Submission for Best International Film. It attempts to paint a picture behind the romance between Margot Fonteyn, a well known ballerina, and Roberto “Tito” Arias, a Panamanian diplomat, who was married and had three children at the time he approached her to propose marriage. According to a public relations spokesperson no one was available to be interviewed. The film “will be available exclusively on IndiePix Unlimited on Amazon Channels” starting November 15, 2024.
Narrated by Mercedes Arias, the couple’s niece who only met them once, the film is made up of family album photos, archival and current videos, interviews and current day images as well as ballet segments performed for the film. While Fonteyn continued to dance until her retirement a shooter left Arias quadriplegic. The film interviews appear to have taken place in Panama, United Kingdom and United States. Two of the interviewees have passed away since they were interviewed. Tito, Margot and Me was winner of the Ibermedia Fund 2019 and the Panama Film Fund.
The documentary was co-directed by Arias and Delfina Vidal, the founder of Betesda Films who works as a director and producer of independent documentaries. She has received two grants from the Panamanian Film Authority to carry out these projects. An example is Case in point: Box 25, a documentary about the construction of the Panama Canal, told through first-person accounts from the men who excavated the Canal in the early 20th century.
Vidal is a director and screenwriter with more than 20 years of experience in film and television production specialized in documentary filmmaking. She directed and produced, with her partner Arias, the documentaries Case in point: Box 25, A Different Day, and Out, la salida está en tu mente. As a university professor, she has taught at the University of Panama, Santa Maria La Antigua University, and the University of the Isthmus.
