Sleep Dealer

Directed by: Alex Rivera

2008 | USA | 90 minutes

Sleep Dealer is a Sundance award-winning sci-fi thriller packed with stunning visuals and strong social and political themes. Memo Cruz is a young man in near-future Mexico. When his family is victim of a misguided drone attack he finds himself with no option but to head north, towards the U.S./Mexico border. But migrant workers cannot cross this new world border – it's been sealed off. Instead, Memo ends up in a strange digital factory in Mexico where he connects his body to a robot in America. Memo's search for a better future leads him to love, loss, and a confrontation with a mysterious figure from his past.

Director Alex Rivera will be present at the screening!

"Clearly, Rivera knows one of the great gifts of the sci-fi genre. An uncanny world invites new ways of seeing. It offers new chances to ask the hard -- and too often, hardened -- questions." - Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post

This film is presented in conjunction with the exhibition Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas, on view at UCR ARTSblock from September 16, 2017 through February 4, 2018. The film program is curated by Sherryl Vint, Director of the Speculative Fiction and Cultures of Science program at UCR, with support from Nikolay Maslov, Curator of Film and Media Projects at UCR ARTSblock.

Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas is part of Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA, a far-reaching and ambitious exploration of Latin American and Latino art in dialogue with Los Angeles, taking place from September 2017 through January 2018 at more than 70 cultural institutions across Southern California. Pacific Standard Time is an initiative of the Getty. The presenting sponsor is Bank of America.

Major support for Mundos Alternos is provided through grants from the Getty Foundation.

Admission is free, but please reserve a ticket to ensure a seat. Unclaimed tickets will be released to the public 10 minutes before showtime.