Panama City, Dec 18 (EFE) - Spanish actor Luis Tosar said on Thursday that he is motivated to star in the film 'It Happened in January', by Panamanian filmmaker and screenwriter Luis Romero, which is in the final stages of filming and reflects on the 'martyrs' of January 9, 1964. About two dozen young people were shot dead by U.S. troops while trying to raise the national flag in the former Canal Zone, controlled by the U.S. During a press conference where the production team gave details of the last week of filming and the projected release plans for the film in 2027, Tosar (Galicia, 1971) noted that he had been 'fascinated' by the story ever he read the script a few years ago. 'There is something very fascinating about this unusual relationship Panama had with the United States over decades,' the Spanish actor said. The multiple Goya Award winner stated that he understands that part of all this is 'this relentless search for identity (national), which is obviously present in the daily life of any Panamanian and which somehow reflects this history' in the film itself. The events of January 9, 1964, were a turning point in the long generational struggle for the recovery of sovereignty over the Panama Canal, which the U.S. built and administered from 1914 until December 31, 1999, when it was transferred to the Panamanian state thanks to the Torrijos-Carter Treaties. In this sense, the production explains that this ensemble film 'weaves together theater, film and documentary to reflect on Panamanian identity and the historical events of January 9, 1964, from a deeply human and contemporary perspective.' Tosar, along with Indhira Serrano, an actress in Colombian film and television, and Jalsen Santana, an actor with a career in Dominican cinema, make up the international cast of the film, which is a co-production of Spain, Brazil, and Panama. Other Panamanian cast members include Lucho Gotti, Isabel Burgos, Luis Gustavo Macías, Michelle Alpízar, and Juan David Guardia. The film by Luis Romero is inspired by the play of the same name by his late mother Mireya Hernández, a theatrical piece that won the Ricardo Miró National Literature Award in 2006. In 'It Happened in January,' Luis Tosar plays Eugenio Torchár, an internationally renowned theater director who travels to Panama and gathers a group of actors to star in a play about the events of January 9, 1964. Tosar told EFE that while he knew something about Panama's history and the Canal, it is true that there were 'certain aspects of the entire decolonization process and this very peculiar relationship Panama has had with the U.S. I don't think we are that far from a similar situation, I hope not, but we are living through things that have a huge echo right here next to us.' Spanish actor Luis Tosar, who stars in the Panamanian film 'It Happened in January', speaks during an interview with EFE this Thursday, in Panama City (Panamá). EFE/ Gabriel Rodríguez. 'We have Donald Trump putting aircraft carriers in the Caribbean, trying to manage and monitor in the most direct possible way the politics and all the geopolitics of Mesoamerica, if not almost the entire world, and I think we are facing a new neocolonial stage, so to speak,' Tosar remarked. 'That is to say, just a few decades ago, there were students who tried to go and exercise their right to put up the Panamanian flag and were met with gunfire from the American army. There were aspects of that entire process that were completely unknown to me and that I somehow discovered by reading the script itself and the play on which this story is based.' The Galician actor believes that the current moment is 'especially sensitive' because, he said, 'many of the things that happened in 1964 (in Panama) are somehow having a tremendous echo in the days we are living through today.'
