Mars Volta’s Leader To Screen Film At Festival

Omar Rodriguez-Lopez is used to getting things done his way.

For the better part of the last 10 years, that has meant the musicians in The Mars Volta following his lead.

But he had to change the way he operated to film his movie, “The Sentimental Engine Slayer,” a film that will be screened at the 3rd Annual Plaza Classic Film Festival.

The film’s cast and crew confronted the writer, director and star of the film to make him change his ways.

“They had a mutiny,” Rodriguez-Lopez told Rolling Stone. “They quit working. They gave me an ultimatum. They said, ‘We completely get it, the doing it-for-doing its sake, but this isn’t about just you. We put in a lot of time and effort on this.’ They wanted it to be submitted to film festivals. They wanted me to release the film. I was angry, but now I understand. Making a film is so enormous, it cannot be done alone, and I want to share experiences, instead of controlling and owning them. I want to move beyond that.” Read the full Rolling Stone interview here.

The is a coming-of-age story of a 20-something about a misfit named Barlam, played by Rodriguez-Lopez.

According to the film’s official Facebook page, “Barlam’s awkward transition from boy to man is as much the story of struggling to find one’s essence in a world of stereotypes as it is an indictment of the distorted reality of family life in the disengaged 21st century. A bottom-rung grocery bagger whose neo-incestuous relationship with his addict sister, Natalia, causes him no small amount of grief and disillusionment, Barlam seeks solace in the convoluted wisdom of what few male peers are available, namely his androgynous, alcoholic boss, Oscar, and the sister’s simple-minded boyfriend, Zack.”

Before he entered the film industry as a writer, director and actor, Rodriguez-Lopez scored Guillermo Arriaga’s “The Burning Plain” and “The Night Buffalo.” Arriaga, the writer of critically acclaimed films “Amores Perros,” “21 Grams,” and “Babel,” has called the Mars Volta the most important band in the world.

“This guy, Omar Rodriguez, is like something between Chopin and Jimi Hendrix,” Arriaga said in a 2009 interview with El Paso publication What’s Up. “He is very talented. “You would never imagine that it’s this guy that plays this kind of very hard rock. It was mellow and beautiful music. We tried to make it eclectic. It’s not a typical score.”

Arriaga said the two bonded over their love of films. Arriaga would mention certain films in conversation and Rodriguez-Lopez will have watched them by the next time they spoke so they could discuss the films.

“We became good friends,” Arriaga said. “Now, by obligation, he has to do the music of every film I direct.”