Stream Julio Torres's fantasy film Problemista on Showmax

Problemista, Rotten Tomatoes’ second best-reviewed fantasy movie of 2024, is now streaming on Showmax.  
 
Problemista is the feature debut of writer, director and star Julio Torres, who has earned five Emmy nominations for his writing on Saturday Night Live and won Peabody Awards for his HBO series Los Espookys and, last weekend, Fantasmas.  

In Problemista, Torres stars as Alejandro, an aspiring toy designer from El Salvador who’s struggling to bring his unusual ideas to life in New York City. As time runs out on his work visa, a job assisting an erratic art-world outcast becomes his only hope to stay in the country and realise his dream.  
 
Oscar winner Tilda Swinton and Emmy nominee RZA co-star, with Oscar nominee Isabella Rossellini narrating.  

Watch the trailer, which has over 1.2m views

In Fantasmas, Torres stars as Julio Torres, who is searching a surreal, alternate New York City for a lost gold oyster earring.  
 
In addition to Swinton, Oscar winner Emma Stone, Emmy winner Steve Buscemi, and Emmy nominees Natasha Lyonne, Bowen Yang and Paul Dano all have cameos.  

Watch the trailer for Fantasmas

In Los Espookys, Julio stars as Andrés, part of a group of friends who turn their love of horror into a peculiar business, providing horror to those who need it in a dreamy Latin American country.  
 
Fifteen-time Emmy nominee Fred Armisen and Writers Guild of America nominee Ana Fabrega co-create and co-star.  

Watch the trailer for Los Espookys

Torres’ viral Saturday Night Live sketches are just as quirky. Imagine Oscar nominee Ryan Gosling playing a man haunted by the use of the Papyrus font in Avatar’s poster. Or Stone playing an actress obsessively creating the backstory for her character – who has one line in a gay porno.  

Watch SNL skit Papyrus, written by Julio Torres, which has over 24m views

Watch The Actress, which has over 13m views:

As those synopses suggest, Torres is one of a kind. Celebrating Fantasmas, the Peabody Awards says the “hilariously absurd HBO show... doesn’t so much defy categorisation as much as it hopes to do away with categories altogether... a fable about how hard it is to remain wholly oneself in a world that demands you contort yourself into conformity.”  

That's a recurrent theme in Torres’ work, which is having a breakout year.  

At the 2025 Film Independent Spirit Awards, billed as “the Oscars of indie film”, Fantasmas was nominated for Best New Scripted Series and Best Lead Performance (Torres), while Problemista was up for Best First Feature and Best First Screenplay.  

Similarly, at the GLAAD Media Awards, billed as the “largest, most legendary LGBTQ celebration in the world,” Fantasmas was up Outstanding New TV Series and Problemista for Outstanding Film – Wide Theatrical Release.  

Alejandro’s hero’s journey in Problemista mirrors Torres’ own life. Born in El Salvador, after university, Torres similarly had little clue of how to realise his huge creative dreams in the US, with the same “added uncertainty of figuring out your immigration status.” 

Despite facing both poverty and deportation, Alejandro’s story plays out more like a magical quest than a sad drama. “I always want to portray things as they feel, rather than as they are, and to me, when I was going through this period, it felt overwhelming, but exciting,” says Torres. “It felt difficult, it felt like a big problem, but it felt like a quest. It felt like an adventure. What I understood subconsciously then, and I understand at face value now, is that the journey is important. All these problems weren't obstacles; they were the thing. They weren't a wall on my way to life – they were life.” 

He links this obstinately optimistic outlook to his upbringing. Alejandro’s mother in Problemista, who raises her son in a fantastical world, is a proxy for Torres’s own artist mother. “She really caused me to imagine things differently. She always made me feel like things could be whatever I wanted them to be and that I should get it my way,” he says, laughing. 

While South Africa celebrates Pride Month in October, you can get an early start and join with the US in celebrating this June by bingeing Problemista, Fantasmas S1 and Los Espookys S1-2 on Showmax now.