Festival of New Cinema from Spain

Festival of New Cinema from Spain

NOVEMBER 14 – 20, 2008

The success of Spain at this year’s Oscar awards serves as confirmation of the complexity and uniqueness of the Spanish artistic scene. Though characterized by the enthralling, the daring, and the unprecedented, Spanish cinema has taken many different directions. Exploring the riskiest visions, Spanish filmmakers have taken their place internationally, not only with renowned actors such as this year’s Oscar award–winning Javier Bardem, but with professionals behind the camera working on successful features like Pan’s Labyrinth and The Orphanage.

Year after year, Spain offers new fearless and passionate auteurs debuting feature films, including Félix Viscarret, Albert Serra, and Rafa Cortés. Festival of New Cinema from Spain brings them together, along with established directors such as Iciar Bollain, Carles Bosch, Gracia Querejeta, José Luis Guerin and Jaime Rosales. Their new films explore diverse storytelling, genre and subjects, and with their previous features form an enriching and impressive body of work.

A sampling of new short films, ShortMetraje includes the works of those who managed to find alternative ways of expression without relinquishing their message. Keep an eye out for young talents such as the promising Eduardo Chapero Jackson.

In a first–rate ensemble of vibrant, polemical, artful and eclectic films, NWFF is happy to offer Seattle audiences a variety of Spanish styles that range from drama to comedy, to experimentation.
 

Organized by Pragda and curated by Marta Sánchez. Support for the exhibition comes from Dirección General de Política e Industrias Culturales and Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales (ICAA) of the Spanish Ministry of Culture, Tourist Office of Spain, Embassy of Spain, Washington, DC., Dirección General de Relaciones Culturales y Científicas, Filmoteca, AECI, of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, Spanish and Portuguese Department of the University of Washington, SAPN Amigos de Espana, and Instituto Cervantes Seattle. Support for the opening reception provided by Freixenet and Tapeña. Special thanks to Honorary Consul of Spain, Seattle.

Series pass $30/NWFF members, $40/general
 
 

Special offer from Tango Restaurant!
Visit Tango Restaurant on your way to or from a film in the Festival of New Cinema from Spain and receive a free "Queso Azul" appetizer. Queso Azul is: Fallen Valdeon blue cheese soufflé, seasonal fruit compota, port wine syrup.  Bring your ticket stub or mention this offer to your server when ordering.

 

Under the Stars

Nov 14, 2008

(Félix Viscarret, Spain, 2007, 35mm, 107min)

Director In Attendance
Festival Opening Night Reception after 8pm show

Director of several internationally acclaimed short films, Félix Viscarret easily makes the transition to features with this offbeat, delicately observed tale that swept the major prizes at this year’s Spanish national film festival in Malaga.

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Me

Nov 15 - Nov 16, 2008

(Rafa Cortés, Spain, 2007, 35mm, 100 min)

Named “Revelation of the Year” by FIPRESCI, the international association of film critics at Cannes 2007, Me is the story of a man who, suspecting he is to be accused of something he hasn’t done, sets out to prove an innocence that nobody yet questions.  Every attempt to correct this mistake leads him closer to the real problem: himself.

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Seven Billiard Tables

Nov 15 - Nov 16, 2008

(Gracia Querejeta, Spain, 2007, 35mm, 113 min)

Upon receiving news that her father is ill, Angela (Maribel Verdú), and her son Guille, travel to the capital. She arrives too late, and learns from her father’s long–time girlfriend, Charo (Blanca Portillo), that the family billiard business is far from good.

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ShortMetraje

Nov 15 - Nov 16, 2008

This is a year of unparalleled creativity for Spanish short filmmakers. In a cloud of turmoil and hallucinatory imagination, these directors present their wildest hopes and dreams in different forms, from experimental plays to shouts of happiness. Free from any convention, this year’s artists have undressed their souls and minds. Come enjoy the journey!

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In the City of Sylvia

Nov 16 - Nov 17, 2008

(José Luis Guerin, Spain, 2007, 35mm, 90 min)

José Luis Guerín nimbly brings moviemaking and moviegoing back to some of their lovely early pleasures in his masterful In the City of Sylvia. He is so successful at modernizing and rarefing these elements that it forces one to reconsider the dialogue and special effects in other films as clutter.

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Mataharis

Nov 17 - Nov 18, 2008

(Icíar Bollaín, Spain, 2007, 35mm, 95 min)

No other Spanish filmmaker bravely portrays the untouchable issues concerning Spanish contemporary society better than Icíar Bollaín. Her previous feature Take My Eyes won every major Goya award. Now, Mataharis was nominated in six categories, including Best Director, Screenplay, Actor and Actress. Bollaín dives into the lives of three private investigators. Ines (Maria Vazquez) is working undercover at a corporation, ostensibly to weed out corruption but actually to report on workers’ efforts to unionize. Eva (Najwa Nimri), recently back at work after maternity leave, struggles to juggle her caseload with family life, when she accidentally discovers a secret her partner has long kept from her. Carmen (Nuria González), investigating a case of adultery, starts reflecting on her own loveless marriage. 

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Solitary Fragments

Nov 18 - Nov 19, 2008

The beautifully nuanced performances of both Sonia Almarcha and Petra Martínez, as well as director Rosales’ keen ability to portray isolation and beauty in the apparently mundane world, makes Solitary Fragments a supreme delicacy not to be missed. Having premiered at the Cannes Film Festival Un Certain Regard section, the film swept three Goyas (Spanish Cinema Awards), including Best Picture and Best Director. Adela lives a quiet life in rural Spain with her son Miguelito. Hoping for more from life, she moves with her son to Madrid, where they share an apartment with a couple, Ines and Carlos. Stylish yet thoughtful and far from melodrama, the film takes you by the hand towards an ending difficult to forget. 

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Septembers

Nov 19 - Nov 20, 2008

(Carles Bosch, Spain, 2007, DigiBeta, 100 min)

For the incarcerated participants of the 2005 Festival of Song, singing love songs is not merely entertainment. It is also a poignant reminder of the people they left behind. Carles Bosch, director of the Oscar–nominated Balseros, follows four men and four women in prison.

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Le Chant des Oiseaux

Nov 19 - Nov 20, 2008

(Albert Serra, Spain, 2008, 35mm, 98 min)

Have you ever thought of the Three Kings’ relationship to one another while they traversed the world’s deserts in search of Christ? Albert Serra, whose previous film Honor de Cavalleria/Quixotic was named “one of the best 10 films of 2008” by Cahiers du Cinéma, is back with a film even more beautiful and crazy than his debut.

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