Iván Cantú-Villarreal

Born in Monterrey, Nuevo León, México; I immigrated to Dallas, Texas in 2001 at eleven years-old with my mom and brother due to a lack of opportunity. Because of strained economic opportunities, I was not able to pursue a higher education to achieve a lifelong dream of becoming a filmmaker. Instead, from the age of sixteen, I worked at embedding myself with local film crews to gain the necessary experience to one day realize that dream. Fourteen years later and as a culmination of award-winning projects which include recognition from national (Portland Film Festival, Marfa Film Festival, Los Angeles Cinefest) and international (Hong Kong Arthouse Film Festival) film festivals, an opportunity to be part of the lighting/camera team in Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio presented itself and I moved my life up to Portland, Oregon to be a part of a production of one of my heroes. An Academy award-winning movie and a critically-acclaimed tv show later (Mike Judge and Zach Woods’ In The Know); I hope to continue my near two decade-long journey as a storyteller and filmmaker by putting together film productions that tell my story and that of many other latino immigrants like me.

I have most recently been inducted as a 2025 Oregon Literary Fellow for screenwriting by Literary Arts and am was a finalist for the Sundance Institute’s Cultural Impact Residency for writers.