Chile will be the Guest Country of the new edition of the Santander International Cinema Week (Spanish initials: SICS) which starts today and lasts until September 18. The program, done in collaboration with Fundación Chile España and CinemaChile, includes four films that offer a cross section the diverse panorama of Chilean cinema today.
This grouping, named Puentes Iberoamericanos (Ibero-American Bridges), will include the acclaimed filmsTengo Miedo Torero by Rodrigo Sepúlveda, El agente topo by Maite Alberdi, La Verónica by Leonardo Medel, and Blanco en Blanco by Theo Court.
”This year we felt it was very important to highlight Chilean cinema, a consolidated cinema that at the same time has some great emerging figures that give Chile one of the most interesting audiovisual industries," says Berta Moreno, Executive Director of SICS.
Four films screened for "Puentes iberoamericanos"
For the first time in Spain, the film Tengo Miedo Torero (Venice Days, 2020) will be screened, presented by its director Rodrigo Sepúlveda and starring Alfredo Castro, who portrays "La Loca del Frente", a drag queen who gets involved in a risky clandestine operation during the Pinochet Dictatorship. Based on Pedro Lemebel's book, the film was one of last year's most acclaimed films, garnering accolades by critics and audiences alike.
The first Chilean documentary nominated for an Oscar, El Agente Topo, also hits the screens at Santander, which will be presented by its director, Maite Alberdi. A story about old age that has been a moving experience for audiences around the world, it tells the story of Sergio, a private detective who investigates a case inside a nursing home.
“For a Latin American team led by women, this seemed like a kind of impossible dream, but this year has taught us to see life from a different angle. The Oscar nomination meant that for every older adult, that the world still sees them and values them, and helped us remember that it is not only important to increase life expectancy, but the desire to live,” Alberdi told us in March.
Mariana di Girolamo, one of the most outstanding actresses from the new generation of Chilean actors, will attend the ceremony to present La Veronica (Horizontes Latinos, San Sebastián, 2021). The actress appears in each shot of the film, playing a popular model on social networks who becomes the main suspect in the murder of her daughter.
To close the selection, the Chilean-Spanish director, Theo Court, will present Blanco en Blanco, winner of the prestigious Silver Lion for Best Director in the Orizzonti section at Venice 2019. Also starring Alfredo Castro, the film is set in the early twentieth century in Tierra del Fuego and tells the story of Pedro, a photographer.
"Blanco en blanco seeks to portray the fate of a society forged through death, a story about the invisible guilt in which we participate on a daily basis. This is the burden that our protagonist carries, in an unexplored land marked by the horror of genocide,” Court told us, prior to its premiere in Venice.
Taken together, these four films demonstrate the power of Chilean cinema, telling universal stories about the elderly, social networks, LGBTQ+ rights, and the legacy of colonialism.
"The quality of the Week makes it a great showcase, and they are also windows that allow us to create and reach direct audiences with samples of national cinema," said Constanza Arena, Executive Director of CinemaChile.
