Guillermo Arriaga

The author, director, producer and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga will be Boek & Meester’s guest on February 1st. He will be talking about his films including Amores Perros, 21 Grams and Babel, as well as his new novel The Savage (translated in Dutch as De ontembare), in a special programme in collaboration with International Film Festival Rotterdam (IFFR).

Moderator: Ernest van der Kwast

The Mexican screenwriter Guillermo Arriaga is well known for his extensive collaboration with the director Alejandro González Iñárritu, with whom he made the widely praised Amores Perros. In 2005 he won the award for Best Screenplay in Cannes for his script, The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada, directed by Tommy Lee Jones. One year later, the script for the award-winning Babel was nominated for a Golden Globe and an Oscar.

Guillermo Arriaga (1958, Mexico City) lost his sense of smell when he was thirteen after a vicious street fight, but its loss would later serve as a source of inspiration for his work. As well as film scripts, he has written various novels, including Night Buffalo, which was filmed by Jorge Hernandez Aldana. The Dutch translation of his novel The Savage will be published in January 2019. It is an overwhelming story about guilt and revenge. It is extremely personal, wide ranging and filmic.

This programme is a collaboration between International Film Festival Rotterdam and Boek & Meester.