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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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The Festival’s official sponsor will give the Transforma Make & Mark Award to the film making the best contribution to generating a critical reflection on today’s social challenges
The feature films competing for the accolade are ‘Tender Loving Care’, ‘Garrat du váimmu / Brace your heart’, ‘Ceniza en la boca / Ashes’, ‘Cinco años, cuatro meses / Five Years, Four Months’ and ‘Fatherland’
Make & Mark, official sponsor of the San Sebastián Festival, has created the Transforma Make & Mark Award, recognising the role of the cinema as an engine of social change and highlighting the work of directors whose films show a solid commitment to achieving a more just society. The award, to be decided among five candidate films from the different Festival sections, will be given at the closing gala of the 74th edition.
At the press conference held today in Tabakalera, the executive director of Make & Mark, Alexandra Petrarota Cabrera, presented the award in the company of the Festival director, José Luis Rebordinos, and of his successor from 2027, Maialen Beloki. As she explained, the jury will be made up of the actor and director Miguel Ángel Muñoz, the director of the Málaga Festival, Juan Antonio Vigar, and the filmmaker and member of the San Sebastián Festival selection committee, Ione Hernández. The jury will have the task of choosing the winning feature film after having studied both the quality of the works and the relevance of their impact on society. The award, coming with 10,000 euros, will go to the distributor of the film in Spain.
The candidate films are the result of a pre-selection made by the Festival from three competitive sections. Thus, contenders for the award in the Official Selection are Tender Loving Care and Garrat du váimmu / Brace Your Heart, by Mike Leigh and Amanda Kernell, respectively: in Horizontes Latinos Ceniza en la boca / Ashes, by Diego Luna, and Cinco años, cuatro meses / Five Years, Four Months, by Esteban Hoyos García and Juan Miguel Gelacio, and in Perlak, Fatherland, by Pawel Pawlikowski.
José Luis Rebordinos recalled that “the cinema occupies a fundamental place as a space for reflection, dialogue and social transformation, thanks to its capacity to bring diverse realities to the public and to generate an impact that extends beyond the screen”. As he said on introducing the award, the aim is to reward films which “as well as displaying cinematography excellence”, also “foster a gaze committed to the major challenges of our time”. “We refer to films that help to generate reflection and raise critical awareness, that address issues related to inclusion, equality, diversity, human rights, social justice and any other aspect helping to promote a positive change in society through culture”, added Maialen Beloki, who thanked Make & Mark for its commitment to films capable of “inspiring positive changes and encouraging a critical stance”.
The creation of this award strengthens the collaboration between the San Sebastián Festival and Make & Mark which this edition becomes official sponsor of the event. The company will also, for the second year running, sponsor the Horizontes Make & Mark Award, going to the best film in the Horizontes Latinos section.
About Make & Mark
Make & Mark is a business group with presence in Spain, the USA and Mexico specialising in the generation of value for brands and bodies through marketing and communication strategies, advertising, media buying, the production of events and premium experiences for some of the world’s widest known brands.
Candidate films for the Transforma Make & Mark Award
Official Selection
Ejva inherits her late father's reindeer herd. As she struggles to keep the herd thriving, local leader Heaika falls for her, and though hesitant, she feels compelled to accept. But everything changes when Nejla, Heaika's cousin, arrives, and Ejva discovers true love for the first time. Betrayed and jealous, Heaika reacts harshly, leaving Ejva with a condition that makes her hands shake uncontrollably, threatening her ability to care for the herd.
Cannes Festival's Palme d'Or winner and Academy Award nominee Mike Leigh returns with his next feature film, continuing his insightful exploration of the contemporary world.
Horizontes Latinos
Searching for a better life, Lucila leaves Mexico for Madrid with her brother Diego to join their mother who has been working there illegally for 8 years to support them. When they finally arrive, the reality that awaits them proves far harsher than they had imagined.
Martha, a mother who lost trace of her son in the Colombian armed conflict, receives the news that no bone match was found in the last exhumation in which she had taken part. Having exhausted the institutional options, she turns to a group of women, where she meets Sandra, who tells her a rumour: "in a remote village in the plains, you can ask a dead person for a favour". The two set out on a journey in search of answers.
Perlak
Fatherland centres on the relationship between the Nobel Prize-winning writer Thomas Mann and his daughter Erika - actress, writer and rally driver. In the summer of 1949, at the height of the Cold War, father and daughter embark on a challenging and emotional road trip in a black Buick taking them across a Germany in ruins - from US dominated Frankfurt to Soviet controlled Weimar. Returning home after sixteen years of exile in the US, Thomas Mann has to face not only a divided fatherland, but also a deep fracture within his own family.
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