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Logline

In 2018 Honduras, amid protests and migrant caravans, a young filmmaker named Jackson overcomes poverty and limitations to make a film that nobody wants to watch until the leader of the local gang seeks him out for using his rap in the film. Instead of punishing him, he offers a music video shoot and a bigger audience. Jackson eagerly agrees, unaware he’s stepping into a dangerous, volatile world.

Synopsis

As a migrant caravan forms in 2018 Honduras, Jackson, a rebellious young filmmaker, uses the chaos to shoot Exodus, a film about forced migration. Obsessed with realism, he and his friend Jonlenon stage risky scenarios, even faking an arrest to film inside a jail. Jackson secretly edits at an NGO where he volunteers.

When the film flops online, it unexpectedly catches the attention of El Black, a local gang leader. Instead of retaliation for using his music, El Black offers distribution through gang networks, turning the film into a local hit, but binding Jackson to the gang. Jonlenon refuses this path and leaves for the U.S., while Jackson stays, drawn deeper into the gang’s world.

After losing his NGO job and facing growing instability at home, Jackson pitches a documentary inside the gang. To prove loyalty, he undergoes initiation. Meanwhile, the barrio edges toward revolt against gang extortion as the small business owners meet in secret to plan an uprising.

When Jackson is ordered to film an execution, he refuses upon recognizing the victim as his friend Bekam. Chaos erupts as armed resistance breaks out. By morning, the gang regains control, and El Black is killed by his lieutenant, Thunder.

Jackson is forced to flee in a new migrant caravan. At the border, surrounded by cameras, he realizes he has become the subject of the very story he once tried to tell.
 

Meet the Filmmakers

Aeden O’Connor-Agurcia — Director, Pulsar Cine
Aeden is an award-winning Honduran writer and director specializing in social dramas and thrillers set in multicultural worlds. His work often explores darker themes with a hard-edged, visceral approach, shaped by his experiences growing up in Tegucigalpa. A key part of his approach involves using real world events, footage, and environments, blending them into his fictional films.

He studied Directing for Film and Television at Emerson College and the Prague Film School, where his thesis film AMCEB won the Bronze Prize Award. His debut feature, 90 Minutes, was praised by The Hollywood Reporter’s Scott Feinberg as “a portrait of contemporary Honduras as seen through the lens of its societal obsession with soccer.” The film won the Audience Award at the Miami International Film Festival. He directed a short film called Homo Deus in 2025 exploring the dangers of brain implant technologies. Aeden is an alum of the 2023 Sony Diverse Writers Program and is also developing multiple feature, television, and documentary projects, all rooted in complex, multicultural narratives. He is represented by The Framework Collective.

Ana Martins — Producer, Fosforito Films
Ana leads the production team in Honduras for the Icaro International Film Festival in Central America and is a founding member of the Magic Linterna Filmmakers
Association. Over the past decade, she has built a steady body of work in Honduran cinema, producing both short and feature films that have earned recognition at
home and abroad. Among her credits, Morazán (2017) was selected to represent Honduras at the 90th Academy Awards and won Best Production at the Icaro
International Festival, while her short Santitos took Best Short Film at the El Heraldo International Short Film Festival that same year. Her feature 90 Minutos (2019) received the Audience Award at the Miami Film Festival. She is the founder of Fosforito Films, a Honduran production company dedicated to independent cinema and new voices with bold, distinctive points of view.

Martha Orozco — Producer, Martfilms
Based in Mexico, Martha is a leading producer of regional Latin American cinema, with a strong focus on socially driven documentaries. Her credits include Allende, My Grandfather Allende (L’Œil d’or, Cannes 2015), Pornomelancolía (San Sebastián, Toronto), and La hija de todas las rabias, a fiction feature from Nicaragua (Toronto). Martha has taught at EICTV Cuba, co-authored a foundational film production manual, and participated in top labs including EAVE, EURODOC, and MEDIA MUNDUS.

Joaquín Ruano — Co-Producer, Cine Concepción
Founder of Guatemala’s Cine Concepción, Joaquín has produced Nuestras Madres (Camera d’Or, Cannes 2019), La Asfixia (FICG Jury Prize, BAFICI Audience Award), and Distancia (Havana First Feature Coral). His work centers on memory, justice, and post-conflict identity.

Mayra Batalla — Actress
Mayra Batalla is a Mexican actress, known for her role in the award-winning 2021 film Prayers for the Stolen, which earned her an Ariel Award for Best Supporting Actress and won the Special Mention award at Cannes’ Un Certain Regard section. She has also starred in Netflix’s Pedro Paramo (2025), Contraataque (2025), and dozens of other Mexican films.

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