From Memory to Horror: Eight New Gen Basque Filmmakers to Track

For a new generation of Basque filmmakers coming into focus at San Sebastián, stories often begin with something unresolved: an argument a child cannot remember, the working lives buried in an industrial landscape, a language whose influence reaches beyond the words spoken on screen. “My films grow from spending time with people and places, allowing […] Meet eight Basque filmmakers making waves at San Sebastián with new films spanning memory, identity, documentary, drama and horror. For a new generation of Basque filmmakers coming into focus at San Sebastián, stories often begin with something unresolved: an argument a child cannot remember, the working lives buried in an industrial landscape, a language whose influence reaches beyond the words spoken on screen.

“My films grow from spending time with people and places, allowing fiction to emerge from those encounters,” Ekain Albite tells Variety. His “Akira” is taking shape between the Basque Country and Georgia. Joana Moya’s upbringing on Bilbao’s industrial Left Bank informs her interest in “who we are beyond work and how the land and its materiality shape us.” For Gemma González Martínez, Basque identity provides a point of departure rather than a limit. “Being Basque gives me a very strong awareness of language, identity, memory