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Most Beautiful Island stars Ana Asensio as Luciana, a young immigrant woman struggling to make ends meet who is subjected to a series of physical and emotional extremes. Before her day is done, she finds herself a central participant in a cruel game where lives are placed at risk, and psyches are twisted and broken for the perverse entertainment of a privileged few.

“[The film is] an intimate exploration of solitude, identity and discovery,” says Asensio, who also wrote and directed the film, which won the Grand Jury prize at the year’s SXSW Festival. “The story was drawn from my own experiences as a young Spanish immigrant in New York City. We shot the film on super 16mm which was both a dream and an enormous challenge to accomplish due to our tight schedule and limited budget. I chose to shoot the film in an intimate, voyeuristic way, mixing professional actors with non-actors in improvised and fluid scenarios. Being an actor myself, it was crucial for me to make sure the performers received the necessary information about the roles they were playing while giving them freedom to improvise. This freedom helped tremendously in achieving the spontaneity and realism I wanted for the film.”

Read the Entertainment Weekly article HERE…