The Basque animation industry is drawing all the right kind of attention. Of the four Spanish projects featured at Cartoon Movie 2025, Europe’s leading co-production forum for animated films which runs March 4–6, two are Basque - Amalur Profezia and My Dad The Truck.
Amalur Profezia blends fantasy and Basque mythology to tell a story of a magical teenager and a gamer as they battle the lord of darkness to save the mythical world of Amalur.
The film is being produced and co-directed by Myriam Ballesteros who set up Alava-based MB Producciones to make animated films and series centered around stories about women and girls. The film is co-directed by Txema Ocio.
MB Producciones’ vibrant slate also includes the series Masked Cinderella and Annie And Carola.
My Dad The Truck is produced by San Sebastian-based Sultana Films, which made Sultana’s Dream which won the Contrechamp award at Annecy 2024.
Directed by María Cristina Pérez, the film follows a man living a carefree life in the mountains with his six-year daughter, until a devastating flood sweeps away everything they have. The film is co-produced with France’s Sacrebleu and Colombia’s Pez Dorado.
Sultana Films’ motto is to make “auteur cinema through international co-productions” and it is also working on a project about writer Federico García Lorca with partners from Mexico, Colombia and Armenia.
Tax relief
Enhanced tax benefits for both local and international producers are a crucial factor fuelling the growth of animation in the Basque Country. Bilbao and its province, Bizkaia, now offer one of the most competitive tax incentives for film and TV in Europe: Producers can claim relief on up to 60% of qualifying spend if the spend exceeds 50% of the total budget; 50% if the qualifying spend is between 35-50% of the total; 40% if for a spend of between 20% to 35%; and if the local spend is less than 20%, the relief is 35%,
There is a further 10% of relief across all spend thresholds if filming takes place or is based in the Basque towns of Vitoria and San Sebastian and is filmed in the Basque language.
Several anticipated Basque animated features are in the works and will be part of the top-level conversations at Cartoon Movie. Top of the list is Decorado, acclaimed filmmaker Alberto Vázquez’s fable about a mouse experiencing an existential midlife crisis. Vázquez’s short on which the feature is based, screened at Cannes’ Directors’ Fortnight in 2016 and went on to win the best animated short prize at the Goya Awards in 2017.
The feature is produced by Basque outfit UniKo in collaboration with Galician outfit Abano Producións and France’s Autour de Minuit and Le Pacte is handling sales.
Leading San Sebastian-based production house Lotura Films, founded by one of the pioneers of modern Basque animation Juanba Berasategui, has several projects in the works, including The Invisibles, a pre-school comedy series whose characters are microorganisms, was presented at the Annecy International Animation Film Market (Mifa) in 2024 and Cartoon Movie in 2023.
International co-productions have become a cornerstone of the Basque animation sector. Beñat Beitia and Elio Quiroga’s Winnipeg, Seeds Of Hope, about a widowed father and his daughter who set sail for Chile to escape persecution after the Spanish Civil War, is produced by San Sebastian-based Dibulitoon and Barcelona’s La Ballesta, with partners in Argentina and Chile.
Dibulitoon recently released Robotia, The Movie and is developing the feature Run, Kuru, Run! by Agurtzane Intxaurraga, as well as Surmarina in collaboration with Latin American partners. Another anticipated co-production with Germany and Belgium is Tobias Schwarz and Aizea Roca’s Heidi, Rescue Of The Lynx, produced by Sumendi Uhartea.
Contact: Ione Feijoo, marketing, communication and international development
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