Nest, San Sebastian Festival's competitive section for short films by film school students worldwide, turns twenty in 2021. The Festival will organise a special programme to celebrate the place where it all starts: a publication, a podcast, a commemorative video and masterclasses running during the 69th edition of the event, in addition to an extended programme in October and November in the shape of the Zinemaldia + Plus programme. 

The Nest section was born in 2002 as the International Film School Meeting, subsequently renamed the International Film Students Meeting (EIECINE). The decision to make the shift from schools to students revealed the Festival's interest in focussing on the filmmakers and their works beyond the academic institutions at which they had trained. In 2008, Tabakalera joined the organisational side of the section, which experienced an exponential increase in the participation of short films and schools. Meanwhile, its programme also grew: days were added to the meeting, as were masterclasses by film professionals such as Bertrand Bonello, Nobuhiro Suwa, Marine Francen, Raymond Depardon, Todd Haynes, Christine Vachon and Albertina Carri.

The 20th anniversary programme will be closely linked to the spirit of Nest. On the one hand, the Zinemaldia daily will and the Festival and Tabakalera websites will publish the research work by the Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola alumni Noemí Cuetos and Marcela Hinojosa, analysing the section from a historical point of view and in the context of general festival studies.

In addition, on September 21 a podcast will be recorded live at the Tabakalera cinema, open to festival pass holders and the general public, with Nest students who formerly participated in the meeting and are now pursuing their careers in film: Kiro Russo (Nueva vida / New Life, Nest 2015), Inês de Lima (De madrugada / At Dawn, Nest 2017), Mina Fitzpatrick (Wandervogel, Nest 2017) and Óscar Vincentelli (Guillermo + Violeta, Nest 2018). Following their time at Nest, all four have gone on to have links with the shared projects running at Tabakalera: Inês de Lima was among the second group of students to graduate from the EQZE while working on her third film, Casa do Norte; Óscar Vincentelli, a student from the first year, presented an installation at Tabakalera, participated in Locarno and Berlinale Talents, and his latest work, La sangre es blanca (2021), won the top award in the Compétition Flash at FIDMarseille; Mina Fitzpatrick returned in March as a resident of the Ikusmira Berriak programme and will participate this month in the Festival's industry activities with the project of her first feature film; and Kiro Russo returned as an Ikusmira Berriak resident and as a filmmaker selected for the Horizontes Latinos section (Viejo Calavera / Dark Skull, Special Mention). This year, following its screening at Venice, he will present El gran movimiento in Zabaltegi-Tabakalera. All of these returning students are linked to the concept of Z365, a Festival all year round, the umbrella initiative for programmes to promote the development of projects by the community of filmmakers participating in the Festival.     

The Festival has also created a commemorative video looking back over the 20 years of Nest conducted by the Festival's Deputy Director, Maialen Beloki; the Head of Training Programmes, Maialen Franco, and the Coordinator of Tabakalera's audiovisual programme, Lur Olaizola. The video, made by the Festival television producer, Morgancrea, includes myriad archive footage recalling the section's major landmarks. 

Lastly, Nest will also come with another two meetings linked to its 20th anniversary. On Monday 20, the students will have the opportunity to talk with the filmmaker Céline Sciamma, whose film Petite maman will screen in Perlak. And on Wednesday 22, the filmmakers selected for Nest and other members of the public will enjoy a conversation with the Belgian filmmaker Laura Wandel, who was selected for the Festival's International Film Students Meeting in 2007 with her short film Murs, and who will present her first feature film in Zabaltegi-Tabakalera, Un monde (Playground), following its premiere in Un Certain Regard at the Festival de Cannes, where it won the FIPRESCI prize.

Furthermore, in October and November, Zinemaldia + Plus, the annual focus with which the Festival participates monthly in the Tabakalera cinema programme, will host a programme curated by Marcela Hinojosa and Noemí Cuetos, featuring ten short films chosen from those selected during the two decades of the meeting. 

Nest is one of San Sebastian Festival's forward-looking initiatives. Filmmakers such as Jerónimo Quevedo, Lea Mysius, Kiro Russo, Oren Gerner, Isabel Lamberti and Grigory Kolomystev, who have subsequently gone on to present their films both in San Sebastian and at other events in the international circuit, took their first steps in the section. In these convulsive times when the film industry and festivals are questioning themselves about their essence and future, a project like Nest has the mission to help the event to find an answer to the direction in which it is heading. It seems obvious that this future will include all of the research work and knowledge of its own history. The Festival is committed to researching its past, through projects such as Zinemaldia 70: all possible stories, because only by knowing its past will it be able, in collaboration with EQZE and TBK, to support the cinema of the future. 

Publication of the article Nest. 20th anniversary by Noemí Cuetos and Marcela Hinojosa (both former students of the Curating speciality at the EQZE). In the Zinemaldia daily and on the Festival and Tabakalera websites.

Meeting with Céline Sciamma. In the Tabakalera cinema. For film students only.   

20th Anniversary Alumni Meeting. Podcast with Kiro Russo (Nest 2015), Inês de Lima (Nest 2017), Mina Fitzpatrick (Nest 2017) and Óscar Vincentelli (Nest 2018). In the Tabakalera cinema. General public: access through the Tabakalera website (prior registration from September 15) / Accredited guests: through the Festival ticket booking system.    

Masterclass by Laura Wandel. In the Tabakalera cinema. General public: access through the Tabakalera website (prior registration from September 15) / Accredited guests: through the Festival ticket booking system.    

Historical rundown of the section, as part of the Zinemaldia + Plus focus. Tickets on sale (3.50 euros) from October 1.