Zinemira will present more Basque productions than ever

Caminan (On The Path)

Short film

Mikel Rueda (Spain)

A road in the middle of nowhere. A car. A bike. Two lonely people looking for the same thing. They meet. World premiere.

Gure hormek ( Our Walls)

Short film

Maria Elorza, Maider Fernandez Iriarte (Spain)

The neighbourhood of Housewives. The district of Insomniacs. The newsstand of the Unknown Mother. The underground of The Lonely Women. Our walls pay tribute to the people we love. World premiere.

Sipo Phantasma (Ghost Ship)

Koldo Almandoz (Spain)

An hour-long cruise, the meta-filmic essay of a vampire moviemaker, a ghost film. The story of the search for a place gives rise to discoveries that lead to other searches. F.W. Murnau and his movie Nosferatu; the love triangle between Bram Stoker, his wife Florence Balcombe and his boyfriend Oscar Wilde. Famous shipwrecks, holidays on board a ship. The stolen bust from a grave, reflections on history and cinema. A tale of Russian dolls who conceal gothic fiction, documentary realism and video essay. Narrative collage with fragments of books, letters, reports, announcements, telegrams, press cuttings, film extracts, puppets. A mirror game with real and fictional vampires; loneliness, dehumanisation, social control. And in the middle of it all, the novel Dracula; its main character, its structure, its background. Premiere at Rotterdam Film Festival.

Baskavígin. La matanza de los balleneros vascos (Baskavígin. The Slaying of the Basque Whalers)

Aitor Aspe Fid

In June 1615, 86 Basque whalers, captained by Martín de Villafranca, Pedro de Aguirre and Esteban de Tellería sailed to the cold waters of Northern Iceland, where they were involved in the country’s darkest episode.

Chillida: Esku Huts

Juan Barrero

At the age of 19, Eduardo Chillida (1924-2002) was a highly gifted athlete well on his way to becoming a football legend. However, a brutal injury during a game put an end to his professional sports career. Nobody except Pilar Belzunce, his life-long partner, suspected that the young goalkeeper from Hernani was about to rewrite his future and die decades later as one of the 20th century’s best sculptors. Chillida: Esku Huts is not a conventional biography, but a poetic, intimate look at an artist second to none. A person who remains alive through his work, his eight children and some of his closest collaborators.

El fin de ETA (ETA. The end)

Justin Webster

The documentary opens with conversations between the President of the Basque Socialist Party of the time, Jesús Eguiguren, and the leader of Batasuna, Arnaldo Otegi, at the Txillarre farmhouse in Elgoibar (Gipuzkoa), held from 2000 to 2004. They refer to the meetings between “Josu Ternera” and Eguiguren in Switzerland and to the different phases – for and against – that alternated in these conversations, with more journeys to Switzerland and Norway, while narrating the conversations with the nationalist left-wing, often with participation of the Basque Nationalist Party of Josu Jon Imaz and Iñigo Urkullu. The arrival to ETA of a new military command with Francisco Javier López Peña, “Thierry”, representative of the organisation’s most radical branch, is on the point of undoing the progress achieved until then.

GUtik ZUra

MªJosé Barriola Baraibar

The idiosyncrasy of the Basque Country is founded on the forest and wood. In this documentary we will travel from antiquity to the future, demonstrating the relationship between the person and wood. To do it, we will take the life experience of the people chosen and the opinion of renowned world specialists to show, by means of a multifaceted combination of history and stories, the principal keys of the forest and wood yesterday, today and tomorrow.

Igelak (Frogs)

Patxo Telleria de la Fuente

Pello, a bank branch manager, is arrested for financial fraud. Abandoned by the superior who got him mixed up in the crime, he scarpers to avoid going to jail and becomes a fugitive. By chance he ends up hiding in a building occupied by battling evicted tenants. Pello earns the group’s trust with the intention of stealing enough cash from them to pay for false documents, move abroad and start a new life.

Iragan gunea Berlin

Maider Oleaga

Iragan Gunea Berlin follows five people from different origins as they move anonymously around the streets of Berlin. Each of them with another life somewhere else, trying to ascertain where to go.

Pedaló

Juan Palacios

A fledgling filmmaker follows the steps of three friends on a surrealistic nautical voyage. Aboard a second-hand pedalo, they set out on a journey of 150 kms leaving from the Basque coast. The pedalo is not, however, made for the waters of the Cantabrian Sea, and no sooner has it started than the voyage spirals into madness: an accident, partying, a hangover, a shaman, a funeral… As he documents the expedition of the three “sailors”, the director sinks into a parallel voyage.

© LAST TOUR

Rocknrollers

Juanma Bajo Ulloa

The yearly Azkena Rock Festival in Vitoria-Gasteiz serves as a gathering place for meditating on the passion for Rock ‘n’ Roll, its essence and extraordinary social extension.

Acantilado (The Cliff)

Helena Taberna

Not in competition

Gabriel receives news of a mass suicide by a sect in the Canary Islands. His younger sister, from whom he has heard nothing for years, was one of its members. Travelling to the island, Gabriel is soon deeply involved in the search for his missing sibling.

Gaur irekiko ditu ateak (Opening Today)

Eriz Zapirain

Not in competition

In 2003 the Spanish National High Court closed down the only existing newspaper in the Basque language: Egunkaria. It closed down the dailypaper and accused members of its editorial board of belonging to ETA. Seven years later is was proven during the trial that those accusations had no basis: all of the defendants were set free. This documentary doesn’t show that sad injustice, but the inspiring creation of the first newspaper in the Basque language, Euskera.

Irrintziaren Oihartzunak (Echoing calls)

Iratxe Fresneda

Not in competition

Portrayal of the creative exile of Mirentxu Loyarte (Iruñea, 1938) one of those brave European film pioneers who live under the cloak of anonymity and who, despite the unfinished projects, has never stopped being a filmmaker.

Mara Mara

David Aguilar Iñigo

Not in competition

Death has been considered and lived in many ways throughout human history. We could say that ours is just like any other, but also that it is so special and different that it breaks away from the relative coherence assigned to it in the past. In Basque, Mara Mara means the sound of snow hitting the ground. Light and darkness pierce this film made during a blizzard in the Pyrenees.

Nola?

Fermin Muguruza Ugarte

Not in competition

Attracted by its charm, Fermin Muguruza went to The Big Easy to record “Irun Meets New Orleans”, where he adapted to the sounds of New Orleans eight songs from his career, interpreted two of the city’s classics, and made a documentary, Nola? about the situation ten years on from hurricane Katrina. All filmed with the crème de la crème of the local scene: from the historical Preservation Hall Jazz Band to bounce rapper Katey Red, with collaborators from Galactic, Dr. John and Trombone Shorty.

Oihalak adarretan

Juanmi Gutiérrez Márquez

Not in competition

There are 10 million Armenians in the world. Of these, 3 million live within what are today the borders of Armenia, independent republic. The remaining 7 million are spread over several countries. They form the so-called Armenian diaspora. All of them, inside and outside of the country, share a single sentiment, almost holy, towards an Armenia which is at the same time splendid and sorrowful.

Pelota II

Olatz González Abrisketa, Jørgen Leth

Not in competition

Documentary on the Basque sport of hand-pelota focussed on the fateful relationship of the pelotari with the pelota ball. Following the players’ obsessive quest to find the perfect ball every game, the film penetrates a country whose modernity has detracted nothing from its existential passion.

Quinta planta (Fifth Floor)

Mikel Rueda

Not in competition

What pushes people to do what they do? For what strange reason do some people still decide, in an individualistic world such as this, to spend part or all of their time helping others? Through the different testimonies of different people, we will meet one of these rare birds. A person who spent part of his life helping others and who, unawares, began one of the greatest changes of our days.

Skhvisi sakhli / House of Others

Rusudan Glurjidze

Not in competition

Georgia, the 90s. Two families have physically survived a short but devastating war in the Autonomous Republic of Abkhazia. Being on the winning side, they are assigned the houses left empty by the losers. But they prove unable to build a new life in peace.

Beti bezperako koplak

Short film

Ageda Kopla Taldea

Zinemira Kimuak

Making the most of the celebrations on the Eve of St. Agatha -a Basque tradition where groups of people, accompanied by improvisers of Basque verse (bertsolaris), go round the houses in a festive atmosphere singing verses to the beat of their walking sticks- the bertsolari Maialen Lujanbio strongly condemns gender violence. Verse after verse, she denounces the different kinds of male violence, and our impossibility to overcome it. Taking the occasion as their excuse, twenty young Basque artists draw on different animation techniques to helm a collective creation.

Caminan (On The Path)

Short film

Mikel Rueda

Zinemira Kimuak

A road in the middle of nowhere. A car. A bicycle. Two lonely people looking for the same thing. They meet.

False flag

Short film

Asier Urbieta

Zinemira Kimuak

Adem Lethani has been tortured and tied up in an abandoned garage. He’s trying to free his hands from the ropes when a SUV comes into the garage and the light goes on.

Gure hormek (Our Walls)

Short film

Maria Elorza, Maider Fernandez Iriarte

Zinemira Kimuak

The neighbourhood of Housewives. The district of Insomniacs. The newsstand of the Unknown Mother. The underground of The Lonely Women. Our walls pay tribute to the people we love.

Hileta

Short film

Kepa Sojo

Zinemira Kimuak

In a Basque village, in 1925, a vigil is underway for the young Inge, wife of Mikel Martikorena, who died suddenly. Visited by the village authorities, Martin, the family patriarch, has only one concern: the absence of his middle son Joanes, who has lost his mind after studying theology and wanders the hills preaching the resurrection of the dead.

Ihesa

Short film

Alejandro Díaz Castaño

Zinemira Kimuak

When Maitane tells her husband Iosu that they have a water leak from the upstairs flat, he decides to go up and talk to the neighbours about it. But the visit will have more than one surprise in store for him!

Renovable

Short film

Jon Garaño, Jose Mari Goenaga

Zinemira Kimuak

Years after they break up, Tania and Josean run into one another at a congress on renewable energies. She’s got plenty to say to him…

Agirre Lehendakaria

Francesc Escribano

Receiving the offer to play the part of Basque President Aguirre, actor Daniel Grao set about researching into the character. The documentary will accompany Grao on his voyage through the President’s personal and sentimental geography, with the objective of creating a human portrait of the Basque leader and being able to perform it.

Igelak (Frogs)

Patxo Telleria de la Fuente

Pello, a bank branch manager, is arrested for financial fraud. Abandoned by the superior who got him mixed up in the crime, he scarpers to avoid going to jail and becomes a fugitive. By chance he ends up hiding in a building occupied by battling evicted tenants. Pello earns the group’s trust with the intention of stealing enough cash from them to pay for false documents, move abroad and start a new life.

Agirre Lehendakaria

Francesc Escribano

Receiving the offer to play the part of Basque President Aguirre, actor Daniel Grao set about researching into the character. The documentary will accompany Grao on his voyage through the President’s personal and sentimental geography, with the objective of creating a human portrait of the Basque leader and being able to perform it.

Iragan Gunea Berlin

Maider Oleaga

Iragan Gunea Berlin follows five people from different origins as they move anonymously around the streets of Berlin. Each of them with another life somewhere else, trying to ascertain where to go.

Quinta planta (Fifth Floor)

Mikel Rueda

What pushes people to do what they do? For what strange reason do some people still decide, in an individualistic world such as this, to spend part or all of their time helping others? Through the different testimonies of different people, we will meet one of these rare birds. A person who spent part of his life helping others and who, unawares, began one of the greatest changes of our days.

Markak

Hannot Mintegia

Gernika. This documentary discovers a society marked by having suffered pain first hand and which is now faced with the task of living a life without violence.

Voces de papel - Un ensayo sobre el movimiento

Estibaliz Urresola Solaguren

Paris is the city that best represents the exile suffered by José Antonio Agirre and it is the setting of this documentary: the place where he decided to make war through culture.