by SARAH ROWLAND

For those of us still traumatized from Antonio Banderas' performance at this year's Oscars, Festivalíssimo couldn't come at a better time. True, the ninth annual Spanish film fest can't undo the damage of listening to Madrid's leading man singing miles away from Santana's soulful notes. But the nine-day fiesta will once again remind us of all that is great about Latino cinema.

Of the more than two dozen features from all over the Spanish-speaking world that will be screened at Cinéma du Parc, 12 are North American premieres. From the drug cartel headquarters we have Resistencia: Hip-Hop in Colombia. In this budget documentary, director Tom Feiling explores what seems to be the last form of freedom of expression for post-Pablo Escobar peasants who are caught in a game of tug-of-war between leftist guerillas and the U.S.-backed right-wing army. As the national guard boots them off their fertile land to make room for foreign investment, the armed rebels point automatics at their heads and kick them back. Out of these oppressive slums a gritty untapped hip hop culture is burgeoning with a scene that makes America's prefabbed pussies look about as un-"real" as it gets. You see, Cali (city just south of Bogotá) MCs don't rap for mo money; they rap for potable water that doesn't give them dysentery. Through his home-video-quality lens, Feiling offers some disturbing insight into abject poverty, as well as a calling card for bullet-proof label reps looking for some killer new beats.

Another hot doc worth checking out is Oro nazi en Argentina, a grim look at how the Swiss Banks and the Vatican helped Nazi war criminals escape to Argentina with their blood-stained fortunes in tact.

Over in Brazil, renowned filmmaker Hector Babenco (Kiss of the Spider Woman) heads back to prison in Carandiru, a film about the most overpopulated AIDS infested penitentiary in South America. Based on a true story, this fictional retelling follows one doctor on his mission to educate the inmates about safe sex and clean needles. The men living in this hell hole are grateful. But as numbers swell, the caged rats get restless which leads to the infamous 1992 Carandiru massacre. After the gov't militia was called in to handle the situation, overpopulation was suddenly no longer an issue. Nothing like shooting hundreds of unarmed men to thin the numbers a bit.

Other highlights at Festivalíssimo include Un día sin mexicanos, a mockumentary that speculates what would happen if the state of California woke up one day and all the Chicanos (legal and illegal) had disappeared. Well, just for starters the billion-dollar agriculture industry would rot in a matter of days and the L.A. Dodgers would be done several of their best players. But more importantly, as the movie points out, without any Latinos, there would be no spice in Cali culture. At times, the piss-take isn't as funny as it thinks it is, but directors Sergio Arau and Yareli Arizmendi do a bang-up job of driving home a message that can be applied to any city, state or province that takes its ethnic diversity for granted.

Festivalíssimo screens from Friday, Mar. 4–Sunday, Mar. 13. For more info, visit www.festivalissimo.net

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