In its fall issue, Filmmaker Magazine unveiled its annual list of “25 New Faces of Independent Film,” a spotlight on the most exciting new voices in cinema. Among those recognized this year is CalArts alum Leonardo Pirondi (Film/Video BFA 22, MFA 25), whose practice blends 16mm film with digital technologies to explore questions of memory, preservation, and the future.
His upcoming debut feature, Fractais Tropicais, imagines a biodome spaceship carrying Brazilian archivists who safeguard the last remnants of Earth after civilization’s collapse. As the crew digitizes plants and birds into an intelligent system that develops its own agency, a lone figure wanders through a ruined Earth. The dystopian narrative reflects on urgent questions of preservation and survival: Who or what is deemed worthy of saving, and why?
At CalArts, Pirondi deepened the experimental sensibility that informs his work. In his interview with Filmmaker Magazine, he described the program as “pretty avant-garde, sometimes to a fault, but [they] give you the tools and allow you freedom. They allow you to make your own films, which is the reason why [I was able to] develop my career while I was in school for a long time,” he said.
CalArts also cemented Pirondi’s commitment to 16mm film, a medium whose constraints he embraces as a positive influence on his practice. “It makes me think about what I’m working through, and it makes me more considerate about how to frame things,” Pirondi said, noting that the softness of 16mm also mirrors his own way of seeing, shaped in part by his astigmatism.
As he prepares for the release of Fractais Tropicais next year, Pirondi is also developing two new features, continuing his exploration of speculative storytelling to reflect on how societies imagine survival and transformation in precarious times. Pirondi’s shorts, including Vision of Paradise, When We Encounter the World (co-directed with Zazie Ray-Trapido), and Adrift Potentials, have screened widely at festivals such as New York Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, and Slamdance.
