05/12/2022 - Projects by Sameh Alaa, María Alché, Naomi Pacifique and Hikaru Uwagawa will also take part in the residency organised by the festival together with Tabakalera and Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola

Director Maddi Barber, who has been selected with her project Forest Clearing

Six film projects have been selected from among the 348 submitted for the ninth edition of Ikusmira Berriak, which will take place in 2023. This programme of residencies and audiovisual project development activities organised by the San Sebastián Film Festival, the Tabakalera International Centre of Contemporary Culture and the Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola (EQZE) has so far thrown its weight behind the creation of 38 titles, standing out among which, to name just two recent films, are El agua [+see also:
film review
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interview: Elena López Riera
film profile] by Elena López Riera (which has racked up two nominations for the upcoming Goya Awards, after taking part in the latest Cannes Directors’ Fortnight) and Suro [+see also:
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interview: Mikel Gurrea
film profile] by Mikel Gurrea, which has just been released in Spanish theatres and is also in the running for two of the Spanish Film Academy’s prizes.

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On this occasion, the selection committee has chosen the following projects, divided into the five categories listed at the end of this article: Ulysses, a Japanese parody of The Odyssey that explores the concept of “home”, by Madrid-based Japanese director Hikaru Uwagawa; after the night, the night, an examination of monogamy as seen from the streets of Amsterdam, helmed by Swiss-Dutch filmmaker Naomi Pacifique; An Erasmus Student's Last Night in Rome, which sees a thirtysomething return to the titular city before discovering that he is no longer the same person, by Bilbao native David Pérez Sañudo (who made his feature debut two years ago with Ane Is Missing [+see also:
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interview: David Pérez Sañudo
film profile]); Forest Clearing, a story that brings together a woman, a man and three roosters in the Navarrese Pyrenees, and which marks the first fiction feature by Navarre-born documentarian Maddi Barber; I Can Hear Your Voice… Still, the tale of a woman who tries to forge her own way through the patriarchal society of Egypt, by Sameh Alaa, winner of the Short Film Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2020 for I Am Afraid To Forget Your Face; and I Love You and Everything Is Beautiful, an intimate melodrama that unfolds in parallel with the events that marked the history of Argentina between the 1940s and the 1960s, by actress-director María Alché, the auteur behind the acclaimed European co-production A Family Submerged [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile] (2018).

The residency period will last eight weeks, split into two legs: on 6 March, the participants will arrive at Tabakalera, where they will work on developing their project until 16 April. During this time, they will be offered guidance from select experts and professionals. In June, each resident will receive development aid of €10,000. Then, in September, they will return to San Sebastián to complete the final two weeks of the residency, coinciding with the festival itself.

During this last phase, they will have the opportunity to present their projects to industry professionals and will benefit from a personalised schedule of meetings with individuals interested in them. Furthermore, post-production outfit Elamedia Euskadi will hand out the Elamedia Euskadi Post-Production Award to one of the selected projects: the prize consists of several services, such as sound and colour post-production, graphic design work and the creation of a DCP master.

The list of projects is as follows:

EQZE

Ulysses - Hikaru Uwagawa (Spain/Japan)

Nest

after the night, the night - Naomi Pacifique (Netherlands)

Basque Country

An Erasmus Student's Last Night in Rome - David Pérez Sañudo (Spain)

Spain

Forest Clearing - Maddi Barber (Spain)

International

I Can Hear Your Voice… Still - Sameh Alaa (France/Egypt)
I Love You and Everything Is Beautiful - María Alché (Argentina)

(Translated from Spanish)