Interview with Houston Latino Film Festival Co-Founders Dave Cebrero and Pedro Rivas

After attending the Houston Latino Film Festival for the first time this year, I can safely say it is one of the most outstanding film festivals in Houston—and even in Texas. Started in 2016 by co-founders Dave Cebrero, Pedro Rivas, and David Cortez, the festival offers an eclectic selection of films, fosters community, and encourages filmmakers from across the world to speak in their unique voice. While the 2025 festival has come and gone, mark your calendars and book your hotels for the 2026 festival next March. 

The festival spawned out of a friendship of those three film fanatics. After meeting at the University of Houston, they sought out to create a festival that focused primarily on Latino filmmakers and the stories they were telling. Starting in 2016 as primarily a shorts driven festival, they have expanded to features, documentaries, even art galleries, music performances, filmmaking workshops, and poetry readings.

As part of my coverage of the festival, I sat down with Dave Cerbrero, the festival/artistic director and Pedro, the program director, to discuss how they started the festival, what it means to be a beacon for Latino filmmakers, and the all-inclusive experience they’ve built in Houston. 

The following conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Can you take us through the sort of genesis of the festival? How do you get something like this off the ground in the first place

Dave Cebrero (DC): Well, I think everything starts with inspiration, right? Your own experiences. Right before I met Pedro, I had sent one of my short films to the Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival, and that experience was eye opening for me—not just getting it to screen, but just being around like minded people; Latino filmmakers. Also being able to see films that are made by Latinos. 

I met Pedro at work, and we started working on a few projects and talking about the idea of a film festival. And that's pretty much where it came from. Pedro is probably the person I know that has seen every film, throw any film at him and either he’s seen it or knows about it. So, we started talking about putting on a film festival. It sounded like a crazy idea at the time.

Pedro Rivas (PR): I'd heard about film festivals like the Latino film festivals in New York, Chicago, LA, and then we were going to the Austin Film Festival to check out their discussion panels, filmmaker Q&A's just films in general, to learn more about filmmaking. I guess it didn't seem weird to me at the time having to travel outside of Houston to not only see a film festival, but also Latino films in general. Once we started talking about it, I just started to look around Houston. At the time it’s almost 50% Latino. Why didn’t we have something that was submission based?

DC: Yes, submission based, and also creating a space where you can come and check out talks and workshops, the full film festival experience.

How has the festival grown since its inception?

PR: Year one, we were really worried if anybody was going to submit to us, if anyone was going to come to the film festival, and we ended up selling out. I mean, we were in one theater at the time, but it opened my eyes to how much Houston needed this community, the Latino filmmaker community. They wanted to see themselves on screen, see their countries on the screen, hear their language. We had one film from Houston in our first year, now we have a whole short film block dedicated to Houstonians every year. Now the problem we have every year is making cuts. We have maybe four screens going on simultaneously, and it's still like, “man, there's so much more I would have wanted to show.” It’s a great problem to have, and it also shows me how much filmmaking is growing in the Latino community. We cut some films that I still thought we should have shown, but it's just that's how much it's growing. It's awesome seeing that growth in the last nine years.

What do you think it is about Houston that makes it the premiere place to have a festival like this?

DC: I think Pedro already hit on it. We're almost 50% Latino, but a very diverse population of Latinos. You have a whole community of Venezuelans and Colombians living out in Katy, in South Central Houston. You have more of a Central American community, and a huge Mexican American community. So one of the things that we talked about early on was not making this just predominantly a Mexican American Film Festival, because that's one of the things I saw. There are so many great films being made in South and Central America, Colombian films, Argentinian films, all of that. You wouldn't get to see those unless you came to our festival. 

You're trying to diversify, not only within film festivals, but also what it means to try and actively pursue films from different creators. Can you talk about what that experience has been like?

PR: When we first started, we did get a lot of films from Mexico, because they have great film schools out there; a filmmaking community. I think it was taking us time to get word out about the festival around the world, across South America. So, it's been interesting over the past nine years, watching the trends. Our second year, we got our first short film from El Salvador, and now we get more short films and feature films from El Salvador. The country's changing and where they didn't have the tools or the safety to make films before, now they're making films with more funding from their government, more safety for their crews. I've seen a trend from the Dominican Republic, over the last four years, three of our openers have been from the Dominican Republic. It's cool seeing the trend of more films coming from Guatemala, Ecuador, and Colombia, Argentina. 

Have you noticed a trend in the types or genres of films that are being made and submitted?

PR: We're getting more sci-fi or animation, different genres, which is awesome. We still have the standard dramatic or political stories, and genre films are definitely fan favorites. We created a short film block dedicated to horror and sci-fi during the festival. 

DC: I have seen a little more out of the box than your standard drama, those are still incredible by the way. But like Pedro said, more genre films, animation, sci-fi. We an indigenous sci-fi, Ituninu, last year that was really unique. I had never even seen anything like it before. But you're definitely starting to see an integration of filmmakers integrating their community with a genre. It's going to be unique and different from how an English-language filmmaker approaches a genre, there's just different sensibilities. There's different ways that films translate, both with actual written language and also the filmic language that comes with something like that. 

That's what's so amazing for a festival goer like me. I'm hearing a language I don't understand, having it translated, but then also seeing it in a filmic language that I do understand. It's just an incredible mix. The programming is so eclectic. How do you maintain your quality of scheduling?

PR: It comes down to story and filmmaking. We are a Latino film festival. We’re showing primarily Latino stories, but also showing the talent and diversity of skills from the Latino community. That's why it's submission-based, we're picking the best films from these countries because they have such strong stories and filmmaking communities that we're just not aware of. They don't get the publicity that they could from an AMC or a Cinemark. So I would say our programming team, we have high standards, but we also recognize a great story. It could be something that just doesn't have the best production, but they have a hell of a story, and we want to give them that spotlight. We'll show their short film, and then maybe two years later, you'll see them come back with a more polished short film or even a feature film. We get to watch the growth of those that we kind of just have a feeling about. 

Everyone I've talked to that’s been involved with the festival has said that it feels like family. How important is it to you both to not only promote these artists, but also foster their growth? 

DC: Oh, it's extremely important. I mean, part of the reason I thought of this idea is because when I came back to Houston, I felt a little lost. Where is the film community here? That's when I started going to First Thursdays, the event that the Houston Film Commission puts together. But even further, it's like, “Where is our Latino film festival here?” So to be able to provide that platform to younger filmmakers, even if it's a small role in the development of those filmmakers, I think it’s one of the best things that the festival does. One of the best comments I hear is, “Man, I met so and so at your festival, and now we're shooting later on this year.” Then they finally show it and that's just really incredible. We are, like I said, part of that filmmaking ecosystem here in Houston, and we're just trying to figure out what else we can do to help nurture that ecosystem.

PR: David Cortez, our operations director, has also been instrumental in adding a lot of the front-end production, like music. He’s been bringing in more artists from LA and Mexico City. So this year we had a pretty good and diverse musical lineup. That's been something that's been really nice the last few years.

DC: Something that I thought would be a one time thing, inviting some poets to do a reading now has turned into a partnership with projects funded by Lupe Mendez, who was a previous Texas Poet Laureate. It's cool having these other areas of Latino art that we can help showcase

At this point it’s going to be 10 years next year. Is there anything that's still daunting to you? 

DC: I think at this point, we just try to meet every year and look at how the previous edition went. Try to see what else we can add to the program, and what’s going to fit within the mission statement. The number one comment I've heard personally during this past year is that year number 10 has to be great. I think for the first time since the first or second year, I do feel a little pressure. Not like it's not going to work, more like, “okay, people are expecting great things from us.” That's a healthy pressure to have, and a good one to have, people have these expectations from the festival now.

Pedro, do you ever just look at the hundreds of short film submissions and think, “oh man, this is going to be something”?

PR: I have a team now, so they help out so much but it still is a lot because it's volunteer-based. I end up watching more than everyone else. Partly because it's a habit for me, but also I just love watching everything. Year 10, I know I gotta have a hell of an opener. That's where I kind of feel the pressure. 

Did you have any standouts from this year's festival? 

PR: For films, probably this Chilean film, Bitter Gold. I always have a favorite film every year, and I don't really tell anybody what it is until after the festival, but Bitter Gold was my personal favorite this year. I was trying to get the director out here, but it didn't work out. It’s this neo-Western Chilean drama set in a mining community where the young teenage girl was the protagonist against this male-dominated mining world. Bob Trevino Likes It was a great film. It surprised the hell out of me to find out that the director was originally from Houston.

DC: One thing that stood out, besides the films, was more attendance. People were a lot more engaged with the panels and workshops. To me, it's a validation that we need more of this stuff. Then, of course, every year we try to bring some good entertainment with the musical acts. Like Pedro said, David Cortez, our other co-founder, did an amazing job of bringing Obed Padilla, a singer-songwriter from California. Everybody enjoyed that, so that's probably one of my highlights. 

What does the future of the festival look like? 

DC: I don't want to say too much, because it all comes down to funding and resources. For us, being a non-profit and entirely volunteer based, it's always a challenge on what we can do. We've been very fortunate enough to have the continued support from the city of Houston, but if we plan to expand, it's going to come down to resources. We do want to extend venues down on Main Street, like Ensemble Theater, perhaps do some more workshops and panels and more short film screenings. Every year it becomes more and more challenging for films to make the cut. So, we would love to be able to have more slots in our schedule.

I also want to recognize the volunteers. Every year we get such a great group of people that are passionate about film and art, but also passionate about serving their community. You asked earlier if there was something daunting or concerning, but getting the help from our community has not been an issue and it's all because of the volunteers.

PR: I'm taking it day by day. I do want to make sure that everybody has a great time next year. With film programming, filmmakers, networking, music, literature, all the arts involved, everyone has a great time and learns something. They get something out of it, whether it was a touching story from a short in Columbia or something they learned in one of the workshops or discussion panels or someone they were able to network with. That's what we want, something that people are able to take home with them and be inspired by. Even us as curators, after the festival is done, I'm really inspired by a lot of what I saw. Whether it's the artists, filmmakers, or even as an attendant, sometimes I can get a break and sneak into one of the theaters and watch the film.

DC: I share the same sentiment. We are the organizers and we curate the festival, but at the same time, we're very much attendees. A lot of times, I'll program a speaker or a workshop that I want to attend. It really comes down to that, and then finally making the decision. It's quickly becoming an event where people are looking forward to just going and networking. I think that's been the thing that has stood out to me the most in the past three years.