Almost a hundred short films have been submitted for the second edition of the competition for short films focusing on social issues called by the San Sebastián Festival and the Sociedad Estatal Loterías y Apuestas del Estado (SELAE), giving one prize of 10,000 euros to the winning title, plus another of 5,000 euros to the runner-up.

The Festival director, José Luis Rebordinos, and the president of Loterías, Jesús Huerta, took the lead today at the press conference held in the Filmoteca Vasca premises, home to the Festival’s archive materials, known as Artxiboa, the setting in motion of which was sponsored by Loterías. Irati Crespo, head of the archive, conducted the guided tour of the facilities on the ground floor of Tabakalera (San Sebastián).

After the visit, it was announced that submissions for the competition have almost hit the hundred mark, a number similar to that recorded for the first edition. June 17th was the deadline for submitting short films aimed at using the audiovisual medium to send positive and encouraging messages fostering the redistribution of wealth, the eradication of inequalities and the achieving of social justice.

The films submitted, which must have at least 51% of Spanish production and a maximum runtime of 10 minutes, are related to social issues such as well-being, beating loneliness and enhancing quality of life among the elderly, support for women victims of domestic abuse and people in a vulnerable situation and providing assistance to cancer patients. 

Six of the almost 100 short films submitted will make up the Loterías Short Films section and will screen on a bill programmed at the Festival’s 73rd edition, to run from 19-27 September 2025. Later, a jury made up of three representatives of the audiovisual and/or social sectors will choose two winning works of the Loterías Award.

“We’re delighted with the response and hope to see the Loterías Award gain in strength year after year”, declared José Luis Rebordinos. The Festival director explained that the majority of the short films submitted come from Spain, although there are also co-productions with other European and Latin American countries. “Some works have been submitted by new filmmakers and others by well-established names, but the common denominator is the quality they share with last year’s shorts. Just remember that the winner of the second Loterías Award in 2024 Cafunè, went on to win the Goya Award for Best Animated Short Film”, he said. 

For his part, the president of Loterías, Jesús Huerta, stressed that “these excellent figures confirm the importance of highlighting the social issues existing in our society”. Loterías, as a public company, shares the Festival’s values of aiming to build a better society, and these awards are yet another step forward in that ongoing work to achieve equal opportunities and social justice” said Jesús Huerta. Lastly, the president of Loterías thanked the Festival and the participants “because culture drives social progress and generates a necessary debate to ensure that people think for themselves”.  

A historical archive open to citizens

The Zinemaldia 70: all possible stories project, promoted by the San Sebastián Festival and the Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola (EQZE) with the collaboration of the Filmoteca Vasca, Medialab Tabakalera and the Kutxa Fundazioa, ran from 2019 until 2022. Loterías y Apuestas del Estado sponsored this project culminating in Artxiboa, the website containing more than 4,100 digital documents from the Festival’s historical archive (letters, photographs, posters, the Festival dailies, etc.), all of which are available for consultation on artxiboa.sansebastianfestival.com.  

The website also offers a catalogue of 35,000+ descriptions of materials available for consultation in situ on request by professionals and specialists from the worlds of teaching and research. Specifically, work on the archive is currently being carried out by Asier Aranzubia, Zigor Etxebeste and Paula Arantzazu Ruiz, the three candidates selected for the third edition of the José Ángel Herrero-Velarde grants given by the San Sebastián Festival and the Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola (EQZE). Their works will respectively analyse the influence of festivals on film production, particularly focusing on El espíritu de la colmena / The Spirit of the Beehive (1973); the retrospectives and visits of filmmakers from Hollywood's Golden Age during the mandate of Miguel de Echarri as director of the event from 1967 to 1977, and the importance from 1965 onwards of San Sebastian's International Meeting of Educational, Scientific and Cultural Cinema and TV, with its contribution to the development of films on the subject of science and medicine.

During this morning’s guided tour Irati Crespo, head of Artxiboa, drew attention to some of the materials to be found in the Filmoteca archives: from the letter answered during his exile in 1960 by Luis Buñuel to the photographs immortalising his reunion with Carlos Saura in 1977, the images of the first woman filmmaker to participate in the Festival’s Official Selection, the Russian Yuliya Solntseva, and the posters designed by the painter Rafael Ruiz Balerdi and the filmmaker Iván Zulueta for the event’s 1977 and 1978 editions, respectively. All of these materials give a rundown of the Festival’s past, necessary for understanding its present day and for tackling the future.