Zinemira will offer 19 Basque productions at the 71st San Sebastian Film Festival
A total of 19 titles (fifteen feature films, one medium-length film, one short and two series) make up the Basque participation in the 71st edition of the San Sebastian Film Festivaldistributed among the Official Section, Special Screenings of the Donostia Award, Zabaltegi, Made in Spain, Zinemira, Velodrome and the Basque Cinema, EiTB and RTVE galas.
The director of the San Sebastian festival, José Luis Rebordinos, announced this Friday the selection of Basque films that will participate in the next edition of the SSIFF, which will take place from September 22 to 30 in the Gipuzkoan capital. Rebordinos has also announced this year, the Festival and the producer associations have decided to pay tribute to the actor Paco Sagarzazuan indispensable figure in Basque cinema and theater in the last 40 years and it will be he who will receive the Zinémira Award throughout his career.
On this occasion, Zinemira, the section dedicated specifically to Basque cinema, will bring together nine fiction and non-fiction titles, three of which, due to their world premiere status, will compete for the Irizar Basque Film Awardalong with two other papers present in other sections of the SSIFF.
In this way, there will be a total of five productions that will compete for this prize endowed with 20,000 euros: “Bidasoa 2018-2023”the new documentary work by Fermín Muguruza; “Bizkarsoro” and “Mirande”, by filmmaker Josu Martínez; the animated film “The Sultana’s Dream”by Isabel Herguera, and “Arnasa betean, emakume zinegileak”by Bertha Gaztelumendi and Rosa Zufía.
Another six films will complete Zinemira’s programming, out of competition for having been released before its screenings in San Sebastián. Among them is “20,000 species of bees” of Estibaliz Urresola; “Irati”by Paul Urkijo Alijo; “The Good Companies”by Silvia Munt; “Mission to Mars”by Amat Vallmajor del Pozo; “Tetouan”, by Iratxe Fresneda; and “A Not So Simple Life”by Felix Viscarret.
On the other hand, in the Official Section it will compete for the Golden Shell “oh how”, Jaione Camborda’s second feature film; while Víctor Erice, one of the Donostia Awards of this edition and the first Basque filmmaker awarded this distinction, will present his return to feature film with, “Close the eyes”50 years after the Golden Shell for his first solo feature film, “The Spirit of the Beehive”.
Likewise, Zabaltegi-Tabakalera will host two Basque productions, the world premiere of the medium-length film “mamantula”directed by Ion de Sosa, and the short “Accountants”by Irati Gorostidi.
In addition, at Made in Spain there will be a screening “The arrival”which has a Basque production and is the feature film debut of Venezuelans Alejandro Rojas and Juan Sebastián Vásquez.
In parallel, the Velodrome will host the premiere of the tenth season of the EiTB musical youth series “Go!azen”; and “Chinese”the new film directed by Arantxa Echevarría (Bilbao, 1968), will be part of the RTVE Galas and, likewise, the EiTB Gala will include the premiere of “Itxaso”the new fiction series in Basque on Basque public television.
Although they will not be screened in a cinema, there will be other Basque productions in the project phase at the Festival, such as “The last night of an erasmus in Rome”, by David Pérez Sañudo or projects like the one that Bonzo Studios will present at the Zinemaldia Startup Challenge .
Zinemira, the section dedicated specifically to Basque cinema, is organized by the San Sebastian Festival and the Department of Culture of the Basque Government. It is sponsored by Irizar and EiTB, and in collaboration with the Basque Film Library, the producers’ associations EPE/APV and IBAIA, and Zineuskadi. This year, in addition, Urbil is incorporated as a collaborator.
Official section with subtitles in Basque
Starting this year, all the films in the Official Section scheduled at Kursaal 1 can be enjoyed in the three official languages of the San Sebastian Festival: Basque, Spanish and English. Thus, each film will be screened in its original version and will include, if necessary, subtitles in those languages.
Zinemaldia on the EITB Primeran platform
At the press conference held today in Tabakalera, the director of ETB, Unai Iparragirre, revealed the first details of Primeran, the new streaming platform that will be launched this month. Virtually all of the content on the platform will be offered in Basque and, among other specific sections, there will be one dedicated to the Basque films that have participated in the San Sebastian Festival in recent decades.
20 titles that will be screened in the different sections of the Festival have the EITB participation. “El sueño de la sultana”, by Isabel Herguera, will compete in the Official Section.
Source: Eitb
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