Mexican Star Eugenio Derbez Wants to Inspire Others with His New Film 'Radical'

Radical

"Radical" starring legendary Mexican actor Eugenior Derbez has officially hit theaters this weekend with a discrete performance at box office.

The film tells the true story of a group of students – the three main roles played by Jennifer Trejo, Mía Fernanda Solís, and Danilo Guardiola– in their Mexican hometown where they are surrounded by corruption, violence, and neglect. They are introduced to a radical way of learning thanks to the help of their professor Sergio Juárez Correa, played by Derbez.

Derbez, the former "Familia Peluche" star, is known for diving deep into his characters to tell a true authentic story. He stated in an interview with The Front Row Network, "The fact that there's so many negative news about my country in the news all over the place, your always watching how many deaths were yesterday or the amount of violence that is in our country right now and I wanted to tell a different story."

He adds " I mean I don't want to hide the reality, of course that exists, but there's another Mexico, there's other Mexicans and there are people like Sergio, this teacher who has a great project or positive people who are trying to make a change in their world and I wanted to tell the story like that. It's inspiring to everyone and makes you have hope in the world again."

Much in the line of Edward James Olmos with his unforgettable performance as high school math teacher Jaime Escalante in "Stand and Deliver," Derbez tells in the interview how he had the chance to talk to the real life Correa to play the significant role of a professor who wanted to make a change for his students.

Alongside telling the touching story and winning awards, the team decided to present to the world the Radical fund. As stated in the description of the fund, "RADICAL highlights a widespread challenge in education: potential is everywhere - but opportunity isn't. Although RADICAL takes place in Mexico, many of the systemic challenges depicted in the film are also present in Latinx communities in the U.S., where students are often concentrated in schools with limited resources. Inspired by RADICAL's story, Participant and Hispanics in Philanthropy created the Radical Fund to raise funds in support of 12 organizations working to close the achievement gap for Latinx students through school retention, graduation, STEAM, leadership development and healing-centered strategies." The fund has extended to cities as big as Miami, Las Vegas, Bronx, Los Angeles, and Tijuana.

The Derbez' produced film has achieved few recognitions so far. The touching film was even awarded "Festival Favorite" at the Sundance Film Festival. Furthermore Rotten Tomatoes has already ranked the inspiring film with a 93% tomatometer and a 100% audience score.

According to Box Office Mojo, since its opening, "Radical" has grossed almost $6 million in markets such as the U.S., Mexico and New Zealand.