Among stacks of money and bottles of liquor, Tony Montana and Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman sit together inside the painting. One fictional, one real, the drug lords look careless.
“This is us!” says filmmaker Raul “RJ” Sanchez with gleeful mischief as I point to the centerpiece of the main wall of their downtown Los Angeles office. Sanchez's partner in art crime, Pascual Gutierrez, tells me they took the shot nearby on Santee Alley.
Located on a street corner in the Fashion District, their space, which doubles as a man cave, reflects their creative influences, their connection to Los Angeles and their quirky sense of humor. Before they moved in 2021, there was a Latino Fashion shoe store here—the sign in the window remains.
Walk in and you'll see the lower half of the mannequin exposing male genitals (“That was our stunt penis from [the short film] “Shut up and fish,” Sanchez laughs.) There's also a bulky metal structure that resembles a torture device, a turquoise-green sofa (which they bought for less than $100), photo books and souvenirs on shelves that once held shoes. It is still a mini-museum of their history. Or, as Sanchez calls it, a “living brain.”
The in-demand duo, known creatively as Cliqua, have already worked with some of the biggest names in the music industry. Their resume includes directing a video for Bad Bunny (“Bad Bunny”).Difficult“), Weeknd (“Take care of your tears“), J Balvin (“Reggaeton“) and Rosalia (“I x you, you x me“).
This year, Gutierrez moved into feature filmmaking with the release of his debut documentary, Serious People, a deeply personal “cringe comedy” that he co-directed with longtime friend Ben Mallincosson. After premiering at the Sundance Film Festival, the film was released in November and is now available to stream on multiple VOD platforms.
On screen, Gutierrez and Sanchez play versions of themselves: music video directors in an industry that takes itself too seriously. Expecting his first child with his partner Cristina Yuan, also a film director, Gutierrez was caught between his commitment to his partnership with Sanchez and his responsibility as a future father. Gutierrez, in Serious Men, hires a body double to replace him in his professional duties.
“There were some things that got in our way that if Raul and I weren't willing to do it, they would have left. The customers wouldn't have been interested unless it was the Cliqua brand,” Gutierrez says. “It was deeply upsetting and haunting to me because it was like, ‘Raoul doesn’t want to have a child, but I do. And it affects us because he can't do everything on his own because people won't let him do it.”
Although both Gutierrez and Sanchez fit into the general identity of “Mexican American,” each consciously embodies a distinct “taste of Mexican.”
“I definitely identify a lot as Chicano,” Gutierrez says. “I’m second generation, and growing up I knew about lowriders and the barrios of East L.A.” Growing up between East Los Angeles and Pomona, Gutierrez believes his Latino identity is unique to Los Angeles.
Sanchez, on the other hand, is the child of immigrants from Mexico City and Jalisco. As a first-generation child in the South Bay town of Gardena, his worldview was shaped differently.
“We've always had this split. You're more aware of what it means to be in this country for more generations, and I feel like I'm new. The culture I'm more associated with is Mexican, but more ranch,” Sanchez explains. A vivid memory for Sanchez is watching his grandfather slaughter a pig and drive around the South Central region in his pickup truck selling it. “The Chicano heritage didn't matter to me, it was more about the immigrant experience,” he says.
“I grew up speaking more Spanish,” Gutierrez says. “But Spanish was Raul's first language.”
Their creative union represents the amalgamation of what each brings to their friendship. Sanchez brought Gutierrez to Los Tigres del Norte and the hallways, and Gutierrez introduced him to “Lil Rob.”Summer nightsand the 1993 film “Blood in the blood“, which Gutierrez considers a seminal cultural artifact in his life.
“We both moved on to each other’s side a little more,” Sanchez says. The two met through their then-girlfriends (now their wives and mothers of their children) almost ten years ago. At that time, each of them was already filming music videos.
“We really bonded over this shared experience of, 'What is it like trying to navigate this industry as a Latino?' adds Sanchez.
For Gutierrez, one of five siblings, his interest in filmmaking stems from one of his older brothers who was leading a double life. “He was a gang member, but he was also a low-key film buff,” he says. “He used to work in arthouse theaters, and we'd just watch weird stuff that little kids could watch. A lot of 'Blood In Blood Out,' but also stuff like 'Amelie.'
With his father's encouragement, Gutierrez attended Chapman University to study film production.
“My parents said, 'When I was growing up, no one ever asked me what I wanted to do. For me, that's not even an option,” Gutierrez recalls. “And the fact that you were accepted into this school, we'll just find a way. We will take all the loans. Go try it and see what it’s like.’ My father gave me the opportunity to follow my dreams exactly.”
Sanchez's path to filmmaking was less linear. He graduated from the University of California at Berkeley with a degree in ancient history and intended to attend law school. Instead, he returned to Los Angeles to try his hand at acting. This interest stemmed from his childhood passion for video games and his college film studies courses.
But how do you start making music videos?
“In the beginning, you often make videos for your friends,” Gutierrez says. “If you're a creative in Los Angeles, you know other creative people, and one of them is a music artist, or one of them is a rapper or in a rock band. And you start from there.”
“My sister was dating a rapper, so I filmed his video,” adds Sanchez.
However, they both aspired to make feature films.
“Even when we started Cliqua, the language we always used to talk about music videos was always film-oriented,” Sanchez says. “That's the influence. We talk in the movies.”
After a meeting and some communication, Gutierrez and Sanchez became eager to work together. This opportunity came along with the video for J Balvin's song “Reggaeton”, which they had to sign up to film without being able to do a lot of preparation. After this positive experience, they decided to create Cliqua, which initially also included music artist Milkman (MLKMN).
The name comes from the book Varrio by Gusmano Cesaretti, an Italian photographer who documented the culture of East Los Angeles in the 1970s, including the Klique car club.
The J Balvin video launched their career. They soon found their niche as reggaeton became popular around the world and a new generation of artists revived its aesthetic. But even when they eventually moved on to other corners of the industry and began working steadily with the Weeknd, they recognized the limits of their creative freedom.
“Music videos are funny because they're obviously not our actual work; we’re catering to another artist,” Sanchez explains. “We bring someone else's vision to life, even if the mission as a whole is open. It's not really us, but we're there.”
“Music videos are hard, man,” Gutierrez adds. “The hardest thing about music videos, which are different from making feature films, is that they happen so quickly. You get the concept and you maybe have two days to come up with the idea and write the treatment. Then you have a shooting date, but the shooting date can be moved or rescheduled depending on the performer.”
In 2023, Gutierrez and Sanchez released their first narrative short film, Shut Up and Fish, about fourEdgar(young Latinos with cup cuts) on a boat. Their impetus was to subvert expectations of stories featuring characters from their community.
“We wanted it to look like [Ingmar] Bergman, because we've never seen that, especially with these kids,” says Gutierrez. One of the actors they cast in the short, Miguel Huerta, plays Gutierrez's chaotic counterpart in Serious Men.
In Serious Men, Gutierrez and Mallinkosson used arthouse references, such as the vignettes in the films of Swedish auteur Roy Andersson or the sense of surveillance in Jonathan Glazer's Zone of Interest. Gutierrez makes sure to mention these inspirations in Q&As and interviews in hopes of sparking curiosity among those watching Serious Men.
“Making [that culture] Accessibility has always been the goal, consciously or unconsciously,” says Gutierrez.
It was an anxiety-induced dream that first inspired Gutierrez to write Serious Men to satirize the entertainment industry. In the dream, Gutierrez went on Craigslist to hire a body double to balance his personal and professional commitments. As soon as he woke up, he explained his dream in detail to Yuan, who suggested turning it into a film.
Gutiérrez brought Mallincosson on board because of his background in documentary filmmaking, but also because he thought working on a film with Sanchez might make it too meta for comfort.
“This industry is so competitive and so demanding that every director is afraid that if you turn down one project, you'll never be seen again,” Mallinkosson says over Zoom from Chengdu, China, where he lives. “At the end of the day, we’re just making movies—like, it’s not that serious.”
Sanchez was initially hesitant about the idea of going on camera, but his loyalty to Gutierrez proved stronger than his doubts. “I really enjoyed seeing myself on screen,” says Sanchez. “When you see yourself so big, you start to understand how you feel about other people in the world, and it was a very interesting out-of-body experience.”
“Vulnerabilities are what make films special, especially this one, because Pascal, Raoul and Christine have opened up their real lives in front of the camera, and it’s very personal,” says Mallinkosson. “When you can be as brave as they are and share your real life, something beautiful happens.”
Gutierrez and Sanchez, who also became a father shortly after our interview, are currently working on a new feature film, Golden Boy, which they describe as a Stand By Me-style story about the four Edgars. One of them believes his long-lost father is former boxer Oscar De La Hoya. They travel to California to confront De La Hoya.
“Music is where we started, but the goal was always to create long forms, to create functions,” Gutierrez says. “And now with Serious Men, one of them is.”
