Narrative Feature Film, 1 hour 10 minutes, Rio Grande Valley Premiere

Synopsis:

Cursed with a fish-like visage and the ability to communicate with the dead he prepares for burial, a lonely mortician finds himself drawn to a restless spirit—sparking an impossible romance that blurs the line between life and death.

Joe Rios Jr

Bio:

Joe Rios is the writer/director/producer/editor of the film Fishman. He was born in Rio Grande City, Tx and through out his high school years he spent them watching movies daily and hanging out at Suncoast or Hastings back in the early 2000's.

"I've had a passion for movies all my life, I just get drawn into the story, especially if the structure and the way everything is nicely put together, the acting, the story, the music, the editing, the directing, it's all magic honestly."

Joe Rios was very influenced by filmmakers such as Sam Raimi, Robert Rodriguez, Quentin Tarantino and Kevin Smith growing up. "I would work at McDonald's in high school and I would either spend all my paycheck on my cellphone bill and movies, buying movies, purchasing tickets to watch a movie, my mom thought I was crazy for buying a copy of Texas Chainsaw Massacre for 50 dollars back then at Suncoast but that's how much I loved the movie, I needed to own it"

He was also in UIL competitions where he competed in many writing categories such as Headline writing and Story writing where he placed and won many awards.

"I knew I had a gift and I knew it all started in my writing, I felt like I had a unique way of telling a story that would translate well with movies, since I've watched movies all my life, I had an idea of what would work and what wouldn't".

Joe Rios would film short films that he would later turn in to valley film festivals such as the STC WILD film contests. He's won awards for films such as "Brownies" for Best Actor and 2nd place film and for "23 1/2", a spoof on the show 24, which won 1st place and Best film.

"It was there where I realized I loved filmmaking and the ability to tell stories, to make people laugh, be entertained."

Since then Joe Rios has never gave on that dream, he has already worked on several productions such as "Eggnog, Sugar Cookies and Misery", which is available on Amazon Prime and he finally got to make his dream project "MANIC!", which will be available this year.

"Oscar, our film's executive producer, came to me and told he wanted to make a movie about a mortician so I basically ran with that idea and created what this film is, I wanted to be respectful to the death industry so I would ask Oscar a lot of questions in regards to the daily life of a mortician and I basically fabricated a story around those types of situations, the film is a dark comedy about life and death." Fishman has officially been selected for the STXIFF for Narrative Feature.

Joe Rios is continuing his filmmaking journey with films such as "Little Miss Perfect" and "Vampire World", both films still in production.