Analysis of the problems facing the rural world of Araba, a region of the Basque Country.
Social & External
Is it possible to travel twice to the same memory? The filmmaker built a cabin on an isolated riverbank, just opposite his childhood island, which had disappeared under the water after the construction of a dam. The goal was to go back to that place, which had become invisible. Only the trees of the island where he’d played stood firm in the middle of the water, like the masts of a broken toy boat, so the air was the only space left, the only vestige of the past to be conquered. This film is a diary of a castaway in memories: four months of a Walden experience in a lost paradise with two hens, a small vegetable garden and a clock that stopped forever at 11.36 and 23 seconds.
A documentary view of the Basque ball-game in which a small hard leather ball is hit against a wall. The film gives an impression of the game itself and of those who play it, not only the star performers (and the myths that surround them), but also those who just play in the streets and alleyways. The film sees the game it its cultural context and conveys the emotions and stories that are peculiar to the Basque country.
The discovery of a series of unreleased tapes leads Juan Carlos Pérez, leader of the iconic group Itoiz, to reflect on the dissolution of the band at its peak, after a clear change of style towards pop that he still denies today. Juan Carlos will thus begin a cathartic journey to the essence of the group, reliving the beginnings of the band as a progressive rock group in Mutriku in the 70's, which will serve him to reconcile with the past.
Departing from peripheral details of some paintings of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, a female narrator unravels several stories related to the economic, social and psychological conditions of past and current artists.
Donostia-San Sebastián, Basque Country, Spain, 2011. Maider, a filmmaker, moves to the very same flat where pedadogist Elbira Zipitria Irastorza (1906-1982) clandestinely established the first ikastola, a Basque school, under the harsh regime of dictator Francisco Franco. Despite of her pioneering work, developed throughout thirty years, her story is not well known, so Maider, intrigued, begins to research…
Day after day, an elderly woman recalls the Spanish Basque country of her youth — while forgetting she is consigned to a retirement home in Chile.
A memory to the victims and a tribute to the survivors of one of the most tragic episodes of the Spanish Civil War: the bombings suffered by the population of Gernika.
The six-decade transformation of a block of houses, shown by means of artfully featured archival shots, highlights the beauty and sadness of human-made decay. In the blink of an eye 66 years pass by and a savings bank replaces a church.
The personal stories lived by the Uncle, the Father and the Son, respectively, form a tragic experience that is drawn along a line in time. This line is comparable to a crease in the pages of the family album, but also to a crack in the walls of the paternal house. It resembles the open wound created when drilling into a mountain, but also a scar in the collective imaginary of a society, where the idea of salvation finds its tragic destiny in the political struggle. What is at the end of that line? Will old war songs be enough to circumvent that destiny?
A singer frozen in old black and white photos. Forever young. Encapsulated. Trapped in the frame, just like her voice on her vinyl records. Forgetting that the point of view is chosen. Forgetting that, in addition to being a singer, Lurdes Iriondo is also an essential reference in the transmission of Basque culture. She understood that children were the key, and she worked for them.
'Ama Lur' is a documentary, directed by Nestor Basterretxea and Fernando Larruquert, that premiered in San Sebastián in 1968, and it is considered the foundation of Basque cinema.
A documentary about Basque inmigrants who went to USA looking for work and a better future. Basically, Amerikanuak talks about feeling homesick, about struggling in a different country to make a decent living and about being part of a comunity.
In this short documentary film about Basque pelota, in addition to showing the different modalities (basket ball, handball, paddle, ratchet...), well-known pelota players of the time take part.
Documentary dedicated to the new Basque music.
An ethnographic documentary which looks at the relationship between music and work in predominantly rural cultures. It depicts the lives of fisherman, shepherds and farmers and their relationship with music. The film also describes Basque ancestral instruments, with special emphasis on the origin and history of ‘bertsolarism’ (Basque verse singing) as a form of oral communication.
Study on the situation of Basque language compared to Spanish.
Debate on the launch of Basque television (ETB, Euskal Telebista).
Documentary on the life of the Basque shepherd and oral improviser (or 'bertsolari') Fernando Aire (1920-1976), known as 'Xalbador'.
Documentary on the relationship between the Basque language and its immediate cultural universe.
The massacre occurred 500 years ago. In 1525, the Spanish Royal Council ordered the execution of five members of a cult recently discovered in the Pyrenees. This event marked the beginning of a relentless, century-long prosecution against Basque witchcraft, which exhibited all the hallmarks of the great European witch hunts, including an unstable border between powerful nations, revolts against the lords, raging misogyny, confessions obtained under torture, and mass accusations. These past five centuries, only one account has been heard: that of the inquisitors and jurists, the same ones who invented the myth of flying witches who met with the devil at sabbats to plot their crimes.
A documentary about how a dominant cultural and demographic institution both sustains their traditional activities and adapts to the digital revolution.
JB Smoove and Martin Starr host a celebration of 20 years of "Spider-Man" movies, from the Sam Raimi trilogy to Marc Webb's movies and the trio from Jon Watts.
A presentation of a case for a needed transition out of the current socioeconomic monetary paradigm which governs the entire world society. This subject matter will transcend the issues of cultural relativism and traditional ideology and move to relate the core, empirical 'life ground' attributes of human and social survival, extrapolating those immutable natural laws into a new sustainable social paradigm called a 'Resource-Based Economy'.
The Making-of James Cameron's Avatar. It shows interesting parts of the work on the set.
The life and career of one of comedy's most inimitable modern voices, Mr. Gilbert Gottfried.
Al Pacino's deeply-felt rumination on Shakespeare's significance and relevance to the modern world through interviews and an in-depth analysis of "Richard III."
A detailing of the rise to prominence and global sporting superstardom of six supremely talented young Manchester United football players (David Beckham, Nicky Butt, Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes, Phil and Gary Neville). The film covers the period 1992-1999, culminating in Manchester United's European Cup triumph.
A nurse is forced to spring a wounded murder suspect from the hospital when the man’s brother kidnaps his pregnant wife and wants to make a trade.
The life of Mr. Spock, as well as that of Leonard Nimoy, the actor who played him for almost fifty years, written and directed by his son: Adam.
When the most wanted man in America surfaces in a small Kentucky town, his violent history -- and a blood-thirsty mob seeking vengeance and a king’s ransom -- soon follow. As brothers face off against one another and bullets tear the town to shreds, this lightning-fast gunslinger makes his enemies pay the ultimate price for their greed.
In 1990s Belfast, a woman is forced to betray all she believes in for the sake of her son.
In the not-too-distant future, as a final response to crime and terrorism, the U.S. government plans to broadcast a signal that will make it impossible for anyone to knowingly break the law.
A real-life undercover thriller about two ordinary men who embark on an outrageously dangerous ten-year mission to penetrate the world's most secretive and brutal dictatorship: North Korea.
In March 2005, Neil Young was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm. Four days before he was scheduled for a lifesaving operation, he headed to Nashville, where he wrote and recorded the country folk album Prairie Wind with old friends and family members. After the successful operation and recovery period, he returned to Nashville that August to play at the famed Ryman Auditorium, once again gathering together friends and family for this special performance.
When a young soldier, newly returned from war, gets caught up in a drug bust, he is recruited by the authorities to go undercover in a notoriously dangerous prison in order to figure out what is really going on.
The Driver is hired by the FBI to help defuse a hostage situation. A disgruntled employee has kidnapped a CEO and has hidden her, demanding $5,088,042. The Driver delivers the money, writing the sum on his hand as instructed by the hostage taker. After he is told that he holds the life of a person in his hand, he is ordered to burn the money. As he complies, the federal agents break in and attempt to subdue the man, who shoots himself in the head before he reveals where the woman is hidden. The Driver then tries to find the hostage before she drowns in the trunk of a sinking car. As a twist, the kidnapped woman is revealed to be the hostage taker's lover. She coldly taunts the dying man in the hospital.
A visual montage portrait of our contemporary world dominated by globalized technology and violence.
Vice detective Bob Hightower finds his ex-wife murdered and daughter kidnapped by a cult. Frustrated by the botched official investigations, he quits the force and infiltrates the cult to hunt down the leader with the help of the cult’s only female victim escapee, Case Hardin.
A documentary chronicling Queen and Lambert's incredible journey since they first shared the stage together on "American Idol" in 2009.
A documentary that explores the downloading revolution; the kids that created it, the bands and the businesses that were affected by it, and its impact on the world at large.
