" And Myra is quite an incredible character: When you put her back into the context of the period, you come to realise quite how audacious she is. Not everybody went running off to Mexico and Guatemala when the urge took them."

Parker adds, "I was also excited by the prospect of portraying Mexico and Guatemala in the 1950's. Although we used two different crews in three different countries there was a lot of crossover, with some of the Mexican crew coming up here, so it was culturally much more of a co-production that normal."

Laurie Parker is one of the most distinctive independent producers of her generation and has already established a unique reputation for original filmmaking. Parker's career began at Islan Alive where ahe worked in a number of capacities on films like "Kiss of the Spider Woman", "She's Gotta Have It" and "Mona Lisa". As vice president of production, she supervised "Crusoe" and acquisitions like "Dark Eyes" and "Chronicle of a Death Foretold".

As vice-president of production and acquisition at Avenue Entertainment, Parker was execuive in charge of production on Gus Van Sant's "Drugstore Cowboy". After leaving Avenue, she became an independent producer and served as executive producer on "The Rapture" and "Afraid of the Dark".

Parker's first two films as producer were Gus Van Sant's "My Own Private Idaho" and "Even Cowgirls Get The Blues". Parker has a number of projects in development including "My Guru and His Disciple" with Jane Campion.