The Fighting Cholitas received an honorable mention in Short Filmmaking at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. It won the Jury Award for Best Documentary at the 2007 Aspen Shortsfest; the Jury Award for Best Documentary Short at the 2007 Atlanta Film Festival; and the award for Best Documentary Short at the 2007 Nashville Film Festival. It was also a finalist for a 2007 International Documentary Association award.

The Fighting Cholitas is a documentary short about a group of bold and fierce Bolivian wrestlers. These indigenous, Indian women jump into the ring every Sunday in their traditional vibrant multilayered skirts and perform the acrobatic maneuvers of Lucha Libre. Fighting Cholitas documents this weekly fight and goes behind the scenes to find out who these women are and what draws them to this unusual sport.

Every Sunday, hundreds of men, women and children pack the Multifunctional Auditorium in El Alto, Bolivia, a sprawling lower income extension of La Paz. They come to watch fights between good and evil where good is usually triumphant. Families attend regularly every week and for an entry fee of $1 per person, escape for an afternoon of live entertainment and “justice served in the ring.”

Short Doc | 21 mins | Bolvina | English Sub-Titles

Director Mariam Jobrani