72nd San Sebastian Festival - 20/28 September 2023
71SSIFF - 22/30 September 2023
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Z365" or "Festival all year round" is the new strategic point of the Festival in which converge investigation, accompaniment and development of new talents (Ikusmira Berriak, Nest); training and cinematic knowledge transfer (Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola, Zinemaldia + Plus, Filmmakers' dialogue); and investigation, disclosure and cinematic thought (Z70 project, Thought and Discussion and Research and publications).
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Agenda
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Official Selection
Films
Films
Official Selection
Official Selection
Álvaro Pastor, Antonio Naharro
Spain
105 min.
Daniel, a young 34-year-old from Seville, is the first European man with Down syndrome to have earned a university diploma. He starts his working life with the public administration where he meets Laura, a workmate with no apparent disability. And he falls in love with her.
Opening Film (In competition)
Atom Egoyan
France-Canada
99 min.
Catherine, a successful doctor, suspects her husband David, a handsome music professor, is cheating on her. To lay her suspicions and fears to rest, she hires an irresistible young woman, Chloe, to test David?s fidelity. Chloe?s torrid tales of her encounters with David lead Catherine on a journey of sexual and sensual re-discovery. But by opening the door to temptation, she puts her family in grave danger...
Closing Film
Rodrigo García
USA
125 min.
Mother and Child is about three women and their great love affairs: with their men, their daughters, and their own mothers. At the insistence of her own mother, Karen gave up the baby she had at the age of 14. Now, 36 years later, mourning the loss of her only child, she meets a man who is willing to bring both family and joy into her life. Elizabeth was the infant of that birth, and now struggles with her own issues of family, sexuality, and power. She, too, has the capacity and the opportunity for love, but it will take her own pregnancy to teach her how to be fully open to the adoration of another human being. Lucy is clear -or so she believes - on her intention and readiness for children. Her own mother will be pivotal as Lucy learns to care for the little girl she has always wanted. Mother and Child is about the choices we make, the chances we miss, the opportunities we seize, and the power of the unbreakable bond between mother and child.
Not in competition
Pelin Esmer
Turkey-France-Germany
110 min.
This is the story of a passionate collector, Mithat, and the concierge of his building, Ali. For Mithat, Istanbul is as vast as his collections, while for Ali, who comes from a country village, it is nothing more than a few blocks around him. When the neighbours decide to have the building rebuilt for fear of earthquakes and the desire for a more valuable house, Mithat's most challenging struggle to save his collections begins. The building becomes the common destiny of these two men living alone, who will involuntarily change each other's fate.
Ana Kokkinos
Australia
115 min.
During the course of one day and night, seven children wander the streets in an urban odyssey. But not all of them will find their way home. Dawn breaks and it?s the same day but now we experience the journey from the viewpoint of their five mothers. Over the course of their respective journeys we understand that they are as lost and defenceless as the children they care for. And by night?s end, one of them must face her worst nightmare.
Lu Chuan
China
135 min.
1937. Japanese troops have entered China's temporary capital, where their cruel occupation will be known as "The Rape of Nanjing." Shot in wide lens black-and-white, the film alternates Japanese and Chinese points of view to brush a compelling and impressionist portrait of the day-to-day living conditions in the devastated city and recount the minute ethical dilemmas demanded by surviving in wartime.
Isaki Lacuesta
Spain
104 min.
Martin, a former Argentinean activist exiled in Spain for over thirty years, gets a call from an old comrade, Raúl, who asks him to return to Argentina. Raúl wants help with the excavation work he?s started in the Tucuman forest in the endeavour to find the remains of their companion, Ezequiel, who disappeared following a skirmish with the army. Obliged to live under the same roof for several days, the old friends soon realise that their way of understanding the world has changed greatly since then. The tension rises and, as the search progresses, we get the feeling that Raúl and Martín have a better idea of where to find Ezequiel than they would have those around them believe.
Aaron Schneider
USA
101 min.
A folk tale and real-life legend about the mysterious, 1930s Tennessee hermit who famously threw his own rollicking funeral party... while he was still alive. A life-long ?wild man? and misfit, Felix Bush has been nearly swallowed up by the power of his town?s sinister myths about him ? until he finds the courage on his own ?funeral day? to make a shocking confession about why he turned away from society. A tale about the snowballing nature of secrets, stories and heartbreak ? and the redemption of telling the truth.
Bruno Dumont
France
105 min.
Shocked by the blind, ecstatic faith of Hadewijch, a young novice, the mother superior sends her packing from the convent. Hadewijch once again becomes Céline, 20, the daughter of a diplomat. Her passionate love of God, her rage and her encounter with Yassine and Nassir lead her off along dangerous paths.
Mohammad Rasoulof
Iran
92 min.
Again Rahmat has been assigned to travel to several islands for a job in which he has been engaged for many years. He has been asked to meet the inhabitants of these islands to collect their tears. Although for years people have been giving their tears to Rahmat, no one knows exactly what he has been doing with them.
Christophe Honoré
France
105 min.
Ever since she broke up with Nigel, Léna soldiers on through life the best she can with her two kids. She valiently overcomes all that life can throw at her. But she has yet to confront the worst: her unstoppable family of do-gooders who have decided, no matter what it takes, to make her happy...
Javier Rebollo
Spain-France
95 min.
La mujer sin piano portrays a typical early 21st century housewife in Madrid. The heroine is a married woman who likes nothing better than the great personal satisfaction of seeing a steaming dish served on the dinner table with admirable punctuality. The movie follows 24 hours in her domestic, working and sexual life, a life from which she decides to escape one night, narrating the events falling within the parenthesis of her evasion. Some may say that this is a film on a housewife?s alienation and slavery, but in fact it?s the tale of a woman, on the threshold of menopause, with neither friends nor social life, who has dedicated her entire life to the family, who doesn?t consider herself to be pretty, who doesn?t like her hair, who allows herself to be carried along on the flow of a single night.
François Ozon
France
90 min.
Mousse and Louis are young, beautiful, rich and in love. But drugs have invaded their lives. One day they overdose, and Louis dies. Mousse survives, but soon learns she?s pregnant. Feeling lost, Mousse runs away to a house far from Paris. Several months later, Louis? brother joins her in her refuge.
Juan José Campanella
Argentina-Spain
129 min.
For 25 years a crime has remained indelibly impressed upon Benjamín Espósito?s mind. Now, in his maturity, he decides to take a look back at the occurrence; to relive that past of love, death and friendship. But these memories, set free, gone over around a thousand times, will change his view of that past. And they?ll re-write his future in the doing.
Matthias Glasner
Germany
107 min.
Chris and little Jenjira are running away from the mafia. Together with Holger, Chris got the 9 year old Vietnamese from human traffickers without being able to pay for her. Maggie is a withdrawn police inspector prone to alcohol who finds out why her husband left her without a word after 16 years. The two meet when Chris is accused of murder. In countless interrogations, the two get to know each other better and confess their hidden fears and dangerous desires to each other.
Jeon Soo-il
South Korea
83 min.
18 year-old In-hwa lives alone in Busan. Nobody knows she?s pregnant, except her closest friend Sang-mi, who persuades her to put the baby up for adoption. In-hwa reluctantly abandons the infant. As time goes by her yearning for the baby grows stronger and she visits the adoption centre to ask if she can have the child back. Staff at the centre reject her request, arguing that the baby will be much better off with her new family. In-hwa, who only has the adoptive family?s address in France, decides to go there.
Fernando Trueba
Spain
127 min.
The arrival of democracy to Chile brings a general amnesty for prisoners not jailed for blood crimes. Ángel Santiago, a youngster determined to get his revenge for the abuse he suffered in prison, sets out to find the famous bank heister Vergara Grey, whose robberies have earned him a reputation he?d rather forget. His plan for a risky theft is complicated by the magical presence of Victoria, a mysterious adolescent ballerina.
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