Argentina will be the country of focus at this year’s San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF), with the festival also organising a day of support for Argentinian cinema on September 24.
The festival unveiled its plans in light of what it described as “the dismantling” of the country’s industry and “paralysis of projects and lack of support from the Argentine government”.
The event is a collaboration with producer Gabriel Hochbaum and Argentinian Academy of Cinematography Arts and Sciences, with a special delegation of producers, moviemakers and journalists from the Latin American country in attendance.
The day of solidarity will coincide with the Official Selection premiere of Diego Lerman’s film El Hombre Que Amaba Los Platos Voladores. The event will host the Argentinian delegation, which will gather on the Kursaal Auditorium stairs prior to the screening in the Trueba cinemas of the film Traslados.
The non-fiction film directed by Nicolás Gil Lavedra, which will be released in in Argentina tomorrow, will have its international premiere in San Sebastian. It examines the executions by Argentina’s last Civic-Military Dictatorship in 1976-1983, known as ’the death flights’.
The Argentinian cinema sector has been suffering amid the suspension of public film body INCAA in March. The government of Argentina’s far-right president Javier Milei claimed it had run up a $4m deficit. In the wake of these troubles, Latin America’s leading audiovisual market Ventana Sur announced it will relocate from Argentina to Montevideo in Uruguay for its 2024 edition, taking place in December.
The 72nd edition of San Sebastian is also showing 16 films produced totally or partially in Argentina. The industry programme includes six Argentinian projects selected for the Europe-Latin American Co-Production Forum, two works in progress in WIP Latam and one Ikusmira Berriak Project with the participation of an Argentinian production company.
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