Prime Video’s ‘Every Minute Counts’ recreates Mexico City during the 1985 earthquake with precision.
Amazon Studios recently introduced their latest series, Every Minute Counts (“Cada Minuto Cuenta”) during the Iberseries & Platino Industria event in Madrid.
This new original drama, based on the 1985 Mexico City earthquake, is Prime Video Latin America’s most expensive production to date.
Directed by Jorge Michel Grau (We Are What We Are), the series uses cutting-edge virtual screen technology, notably the Unreal Engine, which was first popularized by Disney’s The Mandalorian.
Though this technology has been used in smaller Latin American productions, Every Minute Counts is the first to apply it on such a large scale.
The earthquake, which registered 8.1 on the Richter Scale, destroyed parts of Mexico City in just 10 seconds. However, the series focuses on the aftermath and the people who were forever changed by the tragedy.
“The story isn’t about the earthquake, but about the people who decided to become who they are because of it,” Grau said during the event.
The production went to great lengths to recreate 1985 Mexico City with precision. Original building blueprints were used to create physical models that were then scanned and rendered into 3D using Unreal Engine, ensuring that the series offers a detailed and accurate depiction of the city at the time.
Everything from the buildings to the smoke and parked cars is an exact replica of how things looked after the earthquake.
The series stars Osvaldo Benavides, Maya Zapata, Jesús Zavala, and Antonio de la Vega, and sheds light not only on the bravery of citizens during the disaster but also on the government’s attempt to downplay the tragedy ahead of Mexico hosting the World Cup in 1986.
Every Minute Counts will release all 10 episodes worldwide on November 8.
News Source: Variety
