A Mexican family takes a hard look at its hard life in CIRCO

CIRCO (Aaron Schock, 2010)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at Third St.
Opens Friday, April 1
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com
www.firstrunfeatures.com/circo

Setting out to make a film about Mexican corn farmers, Aaron Schock was captivated by a traveling circus and instead decided to tell the fascinating story of the Ponce family. For more than a hundred years, seven generations of Ponces have operated a small circus that makes its way through rural Mexico, delivering such old-fashioned spectacles as contortionism, tightrope walkers, clowns, tiger taming, aerial acts, and the Globe of Death, primarily performed by members of the Ponce clan, including five children. They do everything themselves, from hammering in stakes to put the big top up to driving through local villages announcing their arrival, handing out free tickets to youngsters in the hopes that their parents will buy tickets in order to take them to the show. But what Schock reveals is that the Ponces’ Gran Circo Mexico is not a feel-good, DIY tale of a happy family living and working together in harmony; instead, Tino and his wife, Ivonne, are clashing over their very future. Whereas Tino is dedicated to keeping the family tradition alive, Ivonne wants to have a more normal life, with the kids going to school and making friends. While Tino has passed down the tricks of the trade, most of the Ponces cannot read or write and have received no formal education. And when his brother considers leaving the circus to be with a settled woman, Tino feels the strain of his responsibility even further, forced to decide between the family legacy or starting a whole new life. In his debut feature-length documentary, Schock, serving as director, producer, camera operator, cowriter, and sound man, portrays the difficult lives the Ponces lead, with little money and dwindling audiences, allowing the various family members to tell their moving stories while they prepare for the next performance. Just as Schock doesn’t take sides, audiences will understand Tino’s and Ivonne’s conflicting positions and will feel for both of them in this compelling study of a family in flux. Named Best Documentary at the 2010 Hamptons International Film Festival, Circo opens tonight at the IFC Center; Schock will be on hand to talk about the film Friday and Saturday nights at the 7:50 and 9:40 screenings and Sunday at 4:10.