By Eric Ortiz (@EricOrtizG)
Legend of El Cucuy (2023) is a horror fantasy short film that addresses the difficulties of raising children. Laura (Diana Sanchez) and Carlos (Effie Cacarnakis), an American couple of Latino origin, opted to nurture their daughter Isabel (Obriella Genesis Witron) in a completely different way from how they were raised: with total permissiveness.
Presently, Isabel is having trouble at school. Her teacher (Nicci Bates) is worried about her disobedience and the scary stuff she draws. Isabel’s evident rebellious and sometimes downright rude attitude doesn’t alarm her mother, who continues to indulge her. Her father, on the other hand, thinks that the girl is out of control and that they’re failing as parents.
Legend of El Cucuy concentrates on the boogeyman folk tale, because for Carlos a good corrective action is to scare Isabel by telling her that if she keeps on disobeying, El Cucuy will appear to take her away.
On the occasion of the showing of Legend of El Cucuy at the Slamdance Film Festival – as part of the Unstoppable Shorts section –, I interviewed writer-director Cynthia Garcia Williams.
Eric Ortiz (EO): Why did you decide to use the legend of El Cucuy (the boogeyman)?
Cynthia Garcia Williams (CGW): I was trying to explore a way to tell a story about my greatest fear, which is losing a child.
I was thinking about childhood trauma, misbehaved children, and how as adults when we have our own children we really want to do things a little different than our parents did. And how much discipline is too much? How much is not enough? All of those things came together.
El Cucuy just popped into my head. I was told that El Cucuy was gonna come get me when I was a kid, so I’ve known about him since I was very young. I was thinking, “why is it that he takes the kids and not the parents?,” so I really wanted to show that as parents we hold a responsibility for how our children behave.
EO: Isabel’s parents are too permissive. It’s also mentioned that the previous generation of parents used spanking as a disciplinary method, which is certainly the extreme opposite. Is finding the balance the right thing to do?
CGW: I don’t know if we ever know what’s the right thing to do. As parents, we just try all things and see what works for us.
As a first-generation in the United States, I tried to do things very differently than my parents did. I’m sure they tried their best. Then my daughters tried to do things differently than I have, so it just goes on and on.
I have four kids, so I raised the two older ones much differently than I raised the two younger ones. By the time I had the younger ones, I had gone to college, got a master’s degree, worked in mental health for 15 years with families and children. So I had a different vantage point. And now my daughter has my grandkids and she’s raising them very differently, with a little more discipline. It’s just interesting how the generations view things.
But there is such a thing as permissive parents that really allow kids to just do whatever, let them to self-regulate.
EO: There are various details that reflect that the short was made by someone of Latin American origin, for example when the teacher mispronounces Laura’s name.
CGW: Language is interesting for me, as a first-generation I learned Spanish first. Though I need to practice more often, I think and feel in Spanish.
There’s another line in there about “old Mexico before the U.S. stole it,” that’s an important thing also. I was really trying to drop little things throughout that did showcase our culture.
I really wanted to show that an Afro-Latina might not know about El Cucuy or El Coco, because it’s not in their particular country. A lot of times we get just lumped together, “they’re all the same.” We are but we’re also not, there are different types of Latinos throughout the world.
EO: You offer your own El Cucuy mythology, which deals with a grieving father (David Jofre) who drinks and neglects his daughters.
CGW: I think El Cucuy is very similar to myself in some ways. I have been sober for 23 years actually.
In my previous profession as a mental health provider, I worked a lot with parents that were addicted. There’s nothing scarier than an alcoholic parent.
I love origin stories, especially for villains. I was really trying to show that this evil thing was a man at one point, that was just really damaged. He wasn’t able to take any kind of responsibility for where he was in the world and blamed God. He was dealing with his own trauma also. I had a lot of compassion for him, I just felt so sad for him, and I really wanted the audience to have that too or at least an understanding.
EO: The short goes full supernatural and its outcome is quite bleak.
CGW: My style in pretty much everything that I write has a horror, supernatural, spiritual element to it. It’s all kind of mystical. My style is more Jordan Peele than Stephen King, it’s a little more psychological. Peele speaks a lot to social issues.
Initially the ending left a little more hope, but this was a part of the LALIFF Inclusion Fellowship (Afro/Black Latino Cohort). Netflix sponsored it and so we got some coaching through the script. The Netflix executive that was coaching me thought that it would be better to just make it more finite for the sake of the short.
It is a proof of concept so the story really doesn’t end there. I have the feature version, it’s written and ready to go. Hopefully the short is enough for people that can make it happen to go, “I really want to see what happens here. Did she get her kid back? Where did she go next?” There’s a few Coco or Cucuy things out there, but I believe that this one is different and that it’s an origin story.
I also think that the Netflix executive was right. This ending is powerful. It’s interesting the reactions that I get from people that watch it, some people feel sad, some people are like “that’s what she gets.”