The 16 films included in the Perlak section compete for the City of Donostia / San Sebastián Audience Award, sponsored for the 10th year running by the San Sebastián City Council and given as a tribute to the citizens, who cast their votes to decide the winner.
The Perlak section, sponsored by Armani Beauty, is made up of titles awarded or acclaimed at other international festivals. The screenings will take place in the Victoria Eugenia Theatre and the audience attending the first showing of each film can vote to choose the winning film. The award will be presented at the Festival closing gala.
The City of Donostia / San Sebastián Audience Award is made up of two different awards: one going to the Best Film, coming with 50,000 euros, and the other to the Best European Film, with 20,000 euros. Both films will be forever connected to the city through this award delivered in participatory mode.
The Mayor of Donostia / San Sebastián, Eneko Goia, stressed that “Donostia already breathes cinema in every corner”, remarking that “the engagement of the City Council with the Film Festival has its reason to be in the worldwide repercussion and outreach offered to the city by this event”. “There are many cities, near and far, that dream of having an A-category film festival, that have put a great deal of money into achieving it and that have failed in the attempt. We have one and we must appreciate it and give it the care it deserves”, he said.
In this respect, Goia said that “for nine days a year, we people of San Sebastián throw ourselves into the Festival because we see it as our own, as one of our immovable dates on the calendar”. Furthermore, the Festival is an activity “that generates an impact all year round, making us a world reference which few events achieve”.
Last year the City of Donostia / San Sebastián Audience Award went to En fanfare / The Marching Band, a film by Emmanuel Courcol previously launched at Cannes Premiere. In addition, The Seed of the Sacred Fig, by Mohammad Rasoulof, received the City of Donostia / San Sebastián Audience Award for Best European Film after winning the Special Jury and FIPRESCI prizes in Cannes.
Like in previous years, the San Sebastián City Council will distribute 1.000 invitations to the San Sebastián Festival amongst unemployed people who request them on the municipal website (www.donostia.eus), by calling 010, or at any Udalinfo office. Invitations can be requested from Monday 15th until the Wednesday and are intended for those who are unemployed, registered inhabitants of San Sebastián and over the age of 18. Once their details have been checked by Udalinfo, the tickets can be collected from the Udalinfo Easo office (Calle Easo 41), showing proof of identity and a certificate of unemployment. The deadline for collecting invitations is 14:00 on Wednesday 17th September.
The Festival Director, José Luis Rebordinos, once again highlighted the importance of this collaboration with the San Sebastián City Council, while underlining the significance of the cinema as a “tool of inclusion”. “The Festival aims to continue functioning as a space sensitive towards the city’s social realities and to reflect this facet, not only in its programme, but also in specific actions such as this one, the aim of which is to open doors and to bring the cinema to all citizens”, said Rebordinos.
Contending films
The story behind the creation of the French film movement known as the Nouvelle Vague, focusing on the production of Jean-Luc Godard's ground-breaking movie À bout de souffle / Breathless in 1959.
The renowned psychiatrist Lilian Steiner mounts a private investigation into the death of one of her patients, whom she is convinced has been murdered.
Sisters Nora and Agnes reunite with their estranged father, the charismatic Gustav, a once-renowned director who offers stage actress Nora a role in his comeback film. When Nora turns it down, she soon discovers he has given her part to an eager young Hollywood star. Suddenly, the two sisters must navigate their complicated relationship with their father — and deal with an American star dropped right into the middle of their complex family dynamics.
Until the age of two-and-a-half years old, Amélie describes herself as a digestive tube, inert and vegetative. Then comes the crucial event that throws her headlong into the world of childhood. For the next six months, she discovers language, her parents, her brothers and sisters, the paradise of her garden, her passions (Japan and water), her aversions (the carp), the seasons and time. Everything that, from the age of three, shapes the human person for the rest of their lives.
A year in the life of a family while the parents deal with their separation. The complexities of the family, love and the impact of shared memories through intimate vignettes and strange occurrences.
Two conspiracy-obsessed young men kidnap the high-powered CEO of a major company, convinced that she is an alien intent on destroying planet Earth.
Toni is 15 and lives in Cañada Real, Europe’s biggest irregular shanty town, on the outskirts of Madrid. Proud of belonging to his family of scrap dealers, he spends his days with his grandfather, whom he admires and follows wherever he goes. But the demolition machines are approaching their plot, threatening to destroy everything they know. The grandfather refuses to leave, no matter what the cost. In dark nights with no electricity, the legends of his childhood feel more real than ever before. While everything around him changes, Toni must make a choice: to face an uncertain future or to cling on to a disappearing world.
Jay Kelly, the new film from Academy Award nominee Noah Baumbach, follows famous movie actor Jay Kelly and his devoted manager Ron as they embark on a whirlwind and unexpectedly profound journey through Europe. Along the way, both men are forced to confront the choices they've made, the relationships with their loved ones and the legacies they'll leave behind.
Algiers, 1938. Meursault, a quiet and unassuming employee in his early thirties, attends his mother's funeral without shedding a tear. The next day, he begins a casual affair with Marie, a work colleague. He quickly slips back into his usual routine. However, his daily life is soon about to be disrupted by his neighbor, Raymond Sintès, who draws Meursault into his shady dealings. Until one blisteringly hot day, a tragic event occurs on a beach...
Mariano De Santis is the President of the Italian Republic. No connection to any real-life presidents; he is entirely a product of the author's imagination. A widower and a Catholic, he has a daughter, Dorotea, a legal scholar like himself. As his term draws to a close, amid uneventful days, two final duties arise: deciding on two delicate petitions for a presidential pardon. True moral dilemmas, which become tangled, in ways that seem impossible to unravel, with his private life. Driven by doubt, he will have to decide. And, with a deep sense of responsibility, that is exactly what this remarkable Italian President will do.
Russia, early 1990s. Amid post-Soviet chaos, a brilliant young man, Vadim Baranov, charts his path. First an artist, then a reality show producer, he becomes the spin doctor to a rising KGB agent: Vladimir Putin. At the heart of power, Baranov shapes the new Russia, blurring the boundaries between truth and lies, belief and manipulation. Only the magnetic Ksenia is beyond his control, tempting him away from this dangerous game. Years later, after retreating into silence and shrouded in mystery, Baranov finally opens up, revealing the dark secrets of the regime he helped build.
Set in the Iraq of the 90s, Mamlaket al-Qasab / The President's Cake follows the odyssey of the nine-year-old Lamia as she sets out with her cockerel Hindi to gather the ingredients for the mandatory cake to celebrate Saddam Hussein's birthday.
Brazil, 1977. Marcelo, a technology expert in his early 40s with a mysterious past, is on the run. He arrives in Recife during carnival week, hoping to reunite with his son but soon realizes that the city is far from being the non-violent refuge he seeks.
1949. George Orwell finishes what will be his last but most important novel, 1984. Orwell: 2+2=5 delves deep into Orwell’s final months and visionary works to explore the roots of the vital and troubling concepts he revealed to the world in his dystopian masterpiece… Doublethink, Thoughtcrime, Newspeak, the omnipresent spectre of Big Brother… disturbing socio-political truths which resonate ever-more powerfully today.
January 29, 2024. Red Crescent volunteers receive an emergency call. A 6-year old girl is trapped in a car under fire in Gaza, pleading for rescue. While trying to keep her on the line, they do everything they can to get an ambulance to her. Her name was Hind Rajab.
What starts as a minor accident sets off a series of escalating consequences.