Patricia Cardoso

Patricia Cardoso

Patricia Cardoso is an American director, writer, and producer. She was the first Latinx woman to receive a Sundance Audience Award and a Student Academy Award®. Cardoso's feature film Real Women Have Curves was a box office and critical success and has become a landmark of Latinx cinema. In 2019, Real Women Have Curves was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". Cardoso is a graduate of UCLA's film school and was director of Sundance's Latin American program for five years. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Cardoso's Real Women Have Curves broke many conventions of traditional Hollywood filmmaking and became a landmark in American independent film. According to Entertainment Weekly, it is "one of the most influential movies of the 2000s," and cast "a wide shadow over the new generation of filmmakers to come." The movie is cited for showing "the impact a movie could have in the culture," and it is acclaimed for its nuanced portrayal of its characters and of Los Angeles.

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