CROSSROADS FESTIVAL SHOWCASES BROWNSVILLE FILMS

Panel Discussion on Brownsville Film Making at Brownsville Art Academy, L to R:  Actor/Director Rene Rhi, Director Jose Luis Solis, Producer Rich Rudy and a former TV Smuggler

"It would not cost $7 million here," stated Brownsville actor/director Rene Rhi, as Seattle producer Rich Rudy talked about the cost of a documentary he tried to produce in the Emerald City.

TV Smuggler, produced by Rudy, was one of two short films shown at the Brownsville Arts Academy Tuesday.  The film portrays the lucrative, but dangerous smuggling of color TV's from Brownsville into Mexico from 1978 to 1985, a period during which their legal import was prohibited by the Mexican government.

"You could make $3200 in four hours," explained a former smuggler.

Rudy is pitching the concept as a possible TV series.

El Hombre Bueno, directed by Jose Luis Solis and filmed in Mini Nuevo Laredo, a small, quaint town outside Monterrey, exhibited some dark humor illustrating human survival in a town without water.

When Solis said he would soon be filming again in northern Mexico, Rhi admonished him to "make his third film in Brownsville."

George Ramirez's Brownsville Arts Academy, a work of art in itself, was finally put to proper use during Brownsville's initial Crossroads Festival.  The recording studio is pictured above.