by Bon Labora
Starting October 3 until 11, 2020, the 19th edition of PELÍCULA–Spanish Film Festival will feature the best of contemporary Spanish cinema. Presented by Instituto Cervantes and the Embassies of Spain in the Philippines, Thailand and Australia, the 2020 Spanish Film Festival will screen online eight feature films and four short films.
Since its conception in 2002 by Instituto Cervantes de Manila, the Spanish Film Festival has been an annual attraction in Philippine cinemas. The Covid-19 crisis has posed the greatest challenge in the history of the Festival, and PELíCULA responds by offering online screenings and webinars. Even better, PELíCULA is expanding to two other countries, covering thus three countries in the region: the Philippines, Thailand and Australia.
Each movie will be available for viewing for free at www.pelikula.es for 24 hours, starting at 6pm (in the Philippines and Thailand) and 8pm (in Australia), on the programmed screening date.
The Festival will open on October 3 with La filla d’algú (2019), a film directed by eleven students from the Escuela Superior de Cine y Audiovisuales de Cataluña. Other movies in this year’s line-up are El increíble finde menguante (Jon Mikel Caballero, 2019), the comedy Asamblea (Alex Montoya, 2019), and dramas like Jaulas (Nicolás Pacheco, 2018), and Arima (Jaione Camborda, 2019). Likewise, there will be documentaries such as Mudar la piel (Ana Schulz and Cristóbal Fernández, 2018), and El cuadro (Andrés Sanz, 2019). PELÍCULA will also feature Latin American cinema, with one film from Costa Rica, El despertar de las hormigas (Antonella Sudassasi, 2019).
Aside from online screenings, webinars and online discussions will be conducted with the participation of the directors of the films featured in the Festival. On October 5 there will be a round-table discussion about “Marketing Asian Cinema in Europe and Spanish Cinema in Asia”; and on October 9, the directors of Spanish, Thai and Filipino major film festivals will hold a discussion to answer the question: “Any Future for Film Festivals?”. These may be accessed free of charge through the site www.pelikula.es.
Encounters through short films
The Tagalog word “pelikula” comes from the Spanish “película” (film), which is proof of the deep cultural ties shared between the Philippines and Spain. With this spirit in mind, since its first editions, PELÍCULA had among its main objectives to organize joint Spanish-Filipino programs which could foster dialogue and joint projects between filmmakers from the Philippines and the Spanish-speaking world.
Under a similar approach, on October 10, PELÍCULA will offer “En corto: Short Films from the Philippines, Thailand, Australia and Spain”, in which four recent short films, one from each country, will be featured, and their directors will take part in an online discussion afterwards.
Audience Choice Award
Last but not least, film buffs should not miss the yearly “Audience Choice” Award. Established in 2004, the Premio del Público (Audience Choice Award) recognizes in each edition the film that PELíCULA viewers have voted as the best of the Festival. It is a very popular feature of the Festival among the attending public and that we will maintain in 2020, adapting it to the new condition of online festival. Viewers will be given stubs where they can rate the movie they have seen online. The winning movie will be screened once again on October 11, 6pm, at the Festival’s platform www.pelikula.es .
