With films by such veteran filmmakers as Javier Fesser and Gabriel Velázquez shown side-by-side with cutting edge debut productions from the newest generation including David Planell, and Miguelanxo Prado, there is much to relish in this year’s festival. Presenting new and outrageous interpretations of classic genres including drama, thriller and animation, this year’s styles range from superb examples of Spain’s wrenching fairy tales Camino and De Profundis The Sound fo the Sea, to socially engaged cinema like Amateurs or The Shame.

OTHER SPECIAL EVENTS NOT TO BE MISSED

AN ARTIST TALK WITH DIRECTOR DAVID PLANELL
Friday Nov. 6 4.30 p.m.
We are honored that David Planell, screenwriter and director of The Shame (November 7), will be in person to discuss his filmmaking process and present two of his prizewinning short films, Ponys (2005, 10 mins) and Charisma (2003, 10 mins). This session is designed for students but open to the general public. Admission Free. (c. 75 mins)

SHORTMETRAJE ONLINE
We introduce you to the Spanish short film world - free and open to everyone. CLICK HERE to start watching.

TEASERLAND.COM
Preceding each feature we’ll show mock movie trailers by well known directors such as Isabel Coixet and up and coming filmmakers.

PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE, San Francisco Bay Area
2575 Bancroft Way
Between College and Telegraph

Ticket price
$5.50 BAM/PFA members, UC Berkeley students
$9.50 Adults (18-64)
$6.50 UC Berkeley faculty and staff, Non-UC Berkeley students, Senior citizens (65 & over), Disabled persons, Youth (17 & under)

Filmmaker guest: David Planell, The Shame.

Schedule
AMATEURS Thursday Nov. 5, 6.30 p.m.
CAMINO Friday Nov. 6, 8.30 p.m.
THE SHAME Saturday Nov. 7, 8.30 p.m. Reception with an appearance from the filmmaker presented by Freixenet.
DE PROFUNDIS THE SOUND OF THE SEA Sunday Nov. 8, 3.00 p.m.

TO WATCH OUR ONLINE SHORT FILM FEST CLICK
TO WATCH PREVIEWS CLICK

With Alberto San Juan, Natalia Mateo, Brandon Lastra 
This feature directorial debut from the strongest emerging talent in Spain, award-winning writer David Planell (Seven Billiard Tables, FNSC 2008), boldly allows us a glimpse into the home of Pepe and Lucia, a modern and attractive couple with a big problem: they cannot handle Manu, their eight-year-old Peruvian adopted child. They soon realize the price they must pay if they want to go ahead with their brazen plan: to send him back. Planell, the director of the multi-award winning shorts (Ponys, Trivial) skillfully makes the jump from screenwriter to director, using this strong premise to tell a caustic, tender and funny tale about doubts, paradoxes and the wounds of an ashamed couple. The film was the top performer at this year’s Malaga Film Festival.

With Nerea Camacho, Carmen Elías, Mariano Venancio.
Inspired by real events, CAMINO is an emotional adventure about an extraordinary 11-year-old girl who is simultaneously faced with two completely new events in her life: falling in love and dying. On his third film Fesser (The Miracle of P. Tinto, Mortadelo & Filemon: The Big Adventure) once more offers a child’s perspective on the adult world. The uncompromising script is not anti-religious, though it successfully condemns the dehumanizing effects of religious extremism. It is earmarked for media attention thanks to its biting criticism of the controversial Opus Dei movement and Catholic fundamentalism in general. Widely acclaimed at its San Sebastian debut this year, the film has won 6 Goya awards (Spanish Academy Awards) including Best Director, Best Film and Best Original Script. Above all, CAMINO intertwines melodrama, horror and animation in outrageous new ways to enrich us with what is one of the most powerful Spanish films of the decade.

To view a preview CLICK

With Emilie De Preissac, Francisco Luque, Alberto Díaz, Juanma Hernández
Julio Nieves is a 65-year-old foreman who has spent his entire life in the Madrid suburb of Vallecas. In the blink of an eye, he goes from contentedly facing his retirement alone to the possibility of companionship in the form of a 16-year-old girl from Marseille, who claims to be his daughter. But what if she’s not his flesh and blood? And what if Nieves takes her in to ease the pain of his own solitude? How far can people go to avoid being alone?

To view a preview CLICK

Spanish graphic novelist Miguelanxo Prado, one of the best-known and important European comic artists, turns to animation with DE PROFUNDIS, a simple and lyrical labor of love about freedom, passion and loss. A woman plays the viola while her partner, a painter who is fascinated by the sea, is away on a fishing boat. The boat is capsized by a storm and the painter, along with a mermaid, undertake a dreamlike underwater journey through a series of evocative seascapes. By tracing the creative voyage of the painter using themes brought to life by the digitization of thousands of the director´s own oil paintings, drawings and acrylics, Prado offers an homage to the sea that feels like a return to the early principles of cartoon art. Overall, DE PROFUNDIS is a strange and fantastic love story, sure to please adults and children alike.

To view a preview CLICK