New Movie "Problemista": Man Makes Learning Toys

February 27th, 2024

There is a new movie called "Problemista" that is very interesting and funny. It is about a man named Alejandro who wants to make toys. He thinks toys today are too much fun and makes a toy truck with a tire that goes flat to teach kids about time running out. The man who made the movie is called Julio Torres, and he also acts as Alejandro. In "Problemista," Alejandro comes from El Salvador and wants to work for a big toy company. He needs to stay in New York but has to get a special paper to do so. He meets a woman named Elizabeth who has to sell her husband's paintings to keep him frozen so she can one day bring him back. Elizabeth is not very nice, but she and Alejandro help each other. This movie shows how hard it can be for people from other countries to live in America. It also makes fun of banks and how they treat people. Julio Torres made the movie; he is very funny and worked on a TV show called "Saturday Night Live." The movie has many weird and funny parts about technology not working right, and people acting strange. It even goes 300 years into the future. "Problemista" is like a game where it plays with your mind, and Julio Torres is playing it with us. The movie is not for little kids because it has grown-up jokes. "Problemista" is a movie with many surprises, and it shows us how artists and people from different countries want to be noticed and understood. The movie lasts for 104 minutes. People really like it and think it is very good. If you want to learn more about "Problemista," you can look online.

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💭 Discussion Questions

. What does Alejandro want to make in the movie 'Problemista'?

. Why does the woman named Elizabeth need to sell paintings?

. How long is the movie 'Problemista'?

📖 Vocabulary

🌐 Cultural context

This movie is from the United States, where there are many people from different countries. It is common there for people to have dreams and move to big cities like New York for work. The film industry is large, and comedies are a popular movie genre. "Saturday Night Live" is a famous comedy TV show.

🧠 Further reading

Satire

Satire is a way of making fun of people's mistakes or bad behavior in art, books, movies, and other forms of entertainment. It often uses jokes or clever language to show the silly or bad things that people or groups like companies and governments do. The hope is that by pointing these things out, they might change and get better. When people make satire, they use tools like pretending to agree with the bad things they're actually criticizing, using strong sarcasm, and making silly comparisons. These help to make their point in a funny and smart way. The word "satire" has a long history and comes from an old Latin word that means "a mix of different things." Long ago, Romans wrote a special kind of poetry that was satire, and they used this word to describe it. They were the first to really make satire a big deal in writing, even though the Greeks did something like it before them. Satire can be found everywhere today – even in funny pictures called memes that people share on the internet. It's a popular way to talk about important issues while making people laugh.

Golden Door (film)

There was a film made in 2006 about an Italian family moving to America long ago. The story begins in Sicily and ends in the United States. The film is about the Mancuso family who are poor and live in the mountains in Italy. They get some postcards from America that make them dream of a better life there. They think of America as a magical place with huge vegetables, rivers of milk, and money that falls from the sky. So, the father, Salvatore, decides to take his family to America. They include his two sons and his old mother, who is known for her healing powers. The film shows their journey by boat to the new world. This movie was shown at a big festival in Venice and many people liked it, but it did not get chosen for an award at the Academy Awards. It was a drama and many talked about how beautiful it looked and sounded.

Timeline of Birmingham history

Long ago, in a place called Birmingham in England, many important things happened. People started living there a very long time ago, even before there were kings and queens. Around the year 1200 BC, people made something out of wood and charcoal. Later, the Romans came to Birmingham. They built a fort in the year AD 48 but left it two times, the last in AD 120. The Beormingas clan, who were like a big family, lived there during the time of the Anglo-Saxons. In the 7th century, Birmingham might have begun as a very small village. By the year 968, there was a place nearby called Duddeston. After the year 1066, a family named De Birmingham took care of the area. In 1086, Birmingham was written down as a small village in a big book called the Domesday Book. William FitzAnsculf looked after Birmingham and some places around it. In 1154, a man named Peter de Birmingham got permission to have a market every Thursday. This helped the village grow into a bigger place called a town. By 1160, people built the first church out of stones in Handsworth. By the year 1218, there were farms and mills in Birmingham. People could also cross a river on a path called a ford. William de Birmingham was allowed to have a special market for four days every year starting in 1250. Roads started to connect Birmingham to other places, which was very important for people to travel and trade.