All booked cast will be invited to an Industry Screening in December.
Director's Bio
Guillermo de la Rosa is an award-winning Venezuelan Canadian writer-director based in Toronto, Canada. His directorial work has screened in North America, South America, and Europe, including A Noise That Carries (Toronto After Dark, PANIC Fest, Renegade Film Festival), Light for Freedom (JAYU Human Rights Film Festival, Buddhist Film Festival Europe), and The Crocodile and the Capybara (distributed by Bell Media). His latest short film Forever, Liam continues garnering accolades, including BEST LONG FORM SHORT at Panic Fest and BEST INTERNATIONAL SHORT at Nevermore Film Festival. It’s also an official selection for the Academy Award qualifying Los Angeles Latino Film Festival.
He co-wrote The Shadow of the Sun, Venezuela’s entry for the 96th Academy Awards and is also the author of Su Grito en el Viento, where he adapts real-life encounters with ghosts and apparitions into short stories.
Guillermo draws from Venezuelan folklore, where the mundane and the otherworldly intertwine. Blending naturalism with magical realism, he challenges perceptions of belonging and normalcy and marries the grotesque with the beautiful. He is currently developing his first feature film, inspired by spectres and the nature of death in South America.
| Role type | Role | Gender & Age range |
| Lead | JULIO | Male 8 - 10 Years old |
Description Male, 8-10 years old, Latino. A sensitive, good natured but nervous boy who’s done feeling and being seen as fragile by his family. Raised in a household that treats the supernatural as an ordinary part of life, Julio is pushed to undergo a rite of passage, but beneath that eagerness is a child who is much more frightened than he wants his parents to know. The role is ideal for a young actor capable of naturalistic dramatic work and sustained fear/tension.Special requirements: Will have sickly makeup on skin and in mouth for the duration of shoot. Fluency in Spanish is a bonus but not required | ||
| Role type | Role | Gender & Age range |
| Supporting | XAVI | Male 30 - 40 Years old |
Description Male, 30-40 years old, Latino. Julio’s father. Loving and concerned, Xavi believes in the importance of the rite of passage, but also acknowledges it as something challenging that Julio might not be ready, or able, to face. Xavi should feel like a genuinely good parent whose certainty, rather than cruelty or neglect, might blind him to the risks of the tradition.
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| Role type | Role | Gender & Age range |
| Supporting | LAURA | Female 60 - 70 Years old |
Description Female, 60-7 years old, Latino. Julio’s grandmother and primary maternal figure. Warm, practical and deeply loving, Laura has absolute faith in the traditions she was raised with, including the belief that confronting the ghost that arrives during a fever is an important rite of passage. To her, allowing Julio to face his fear is an act of care, as she wants to give him the gift of opportunity to face his fears and grow. Affectionate and reassuring, but stubborn when her worldview is challenged. The role should feel grounded and emotionally sincere. The audience needs to understand why Julio trusts her.
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| Role type | Role | Gender & Age range |
| Supporting | Saúl | Male 40 - 70 Years old |
Description Male, 40-70 years old, open ethnicity. A tortured ghost, haunted by a life of love and luxury he couldn’t have and desperate to feel it one more time before he fades forever. He’s chosen Julio to be the provider of this experience. Saúl is unsettling not because he behaves like a conventional monster, but because he feels strangely human: needy, playful, intrusive and increasingly difficult to read. He wants Julio’s attention and companionship, approaching him with the familiarity of someone who doesn’t quite understand or respect a child’s boundaries. Requires an actor with strong physical presence who can move naturally between absurdity and menace without playing an overt horror villain.
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