17th Sebastiane Award Winner

Gehitu, the Basque Association of Gays, Lesbians, Bisexuals and Transexuals, and, on behalf of Gehitu, the Sebastiane Award’s Jury has decided to grant the XVII Sebastiane award to In Between by Maysaloun Hamoud.



Bar Bahar (In Between), Maysaloun Hamoud, Israel and France (L)

Jury Statement
For showing the reality of three women who pay a high price for conquering a slot of liberty where they may be themselves, in a society where whatever they do, they seem not to fit. For reflecting as well the struggle from everyday life against the “ism”s and phobias such as machismo and fundamentalism towards homo/lesbo phobias.

The movie denounces the ways to keep prejudices and power positions we shield behind tradition, familiar and religious values; opposing the stifling reality from the rural environment to the “island of freedom” represented by Tel-Aviv. And for expressing it all in a high-spirited story, with a fresh and courageous rhythm which helps the viewer to identify himself/herself with the characters.

2016 will be remembered as the milestone year where two female directors won both Sebastiane awards as remember Pepa San Martin won the Sebastiane Latino for Rara.



To check info about the award at the official site go here.

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9/9/16
Next September 23, the NGO Gehitu will present the Sebastiane award to the film production which best reflects the reality, freedom and social progress of the LGBT group. Celebrating its 17th edition this year, the award will be presented within the San Sebastian Film Festival which will take place between September 16th to 24th.

There are eleven (11) films that will compete for the 2016 award, films that come from San Sebastian festival Official Selection, Horizontes Latinos, Zabaltegi and New Directors sections. To complete the lineup there are three (3) short films that are Out of Competition.

Also worth mentioning is the screening on the Horizontes Latinos section of the winning film of the Sebastiane Latino Award, Rara by Pepa San Martín. On September 19th to 21th, the 2nd International LGBTI Film Festivals Conference will take place with participating countries from Latin America and Spain. The event, brought together by San Sebastian Film Festival and Spain’s Public Agency for Culture Action, tries to build links between the two continents as well as become a framework for reflection about the reality of this kind of festivals.

Will try to identify the LGBT interest of each movie, at least as much as available info allows to infer.

Official Selection

As You Are, Miles Joris Peyrafitte, USA (G)

Synopsis: Jack is a high school student who lives with his single mother Karen in a nondescript suburban town. Considered a social outcast and loner, Jack is friendless until Karen’s new boyfriend Tom moves in and brings his son Mark into their lives. The two outsiders quickly bond and form a tight friendship and, after a chance encounter at a diner, bring fellow student Sarah into their group. The three teens become each other saving grace until changing relationships and emerging secrets force them to look at themselves and see how far they are willing to go to live the lives they choose.



怒り Ikari (Rage), Lee Sang-il, Japan (G)

Synopsis: A man brutally murders a married couple and leaves behind the words "Ikari" ("Anger") written with their blood. The killer undergoes plastic surgery and flees. At 3 different locations in Japan, a male stranger appear. People there suspect that the stranger might be the murderer. At a fishing harbor in Chiba, Yohei Maki (Ken Watanabe) works at the harbor and he has a daughter, Aiko (Aoi Miyazaki). Aiko begins to date Tetsuya Tashiro (Kenichi Matsuyama). Yohei begins to suspect that his daughter's boyfriend might be the killer, because he is using a fake name.
In downtown Tokyo, gay male Yuma Fujita (Satoshi Tsumabuki) works at an advertising agency. He meets Naoto Onishi (Gou Ayano) and they begin to live together. While getting Naoto to open his mind, Yuma begins to suspect Naoto as the killer. In Okinawa, Izumi Komiya (Suzu Hirose) and her mother move to an isolated island there. One day, she takes a walk and meets Shingo Tanaka (Mirai Moriyama). The young is backpacking alone. Izumi gets close to Shingo, but Shingo asks Izumi to not to tell others about him.



Jesús, Fernando Guzzoni, Chile, France, Germany and Greece

Synopsis: Santiago, Chile. Jesús, 18, lives alone with his father Hector in a flat where the TV covers up their inability to communicate. The rest of the time, he dances in a K-pop band, hangs out with friends and does drugs, watches trashy clips and has sex in public places, looking for a thrill. One night, he finds it with his friends, being involved in an irreversible misadventure.



Orpheline (Orphan), Arnaud Des Pallières, France (L)

Synopsis: Four moments in the lives of four female characters. A little girl from the countryside, playing a game of hide and seek that turns to tragedy. A teenager, caught in an endless succession of runaways, men and mishaps, because anything is better than her desolate family home. A young woman who moves to Paris and has a brush with disaster. The grown-up at last, an accomplished woman, who thought she was safe from her own past. Gradually, these characters come together to form a single heroine.



New Directors

Bar Bahar (In Between), Maysaloun Hamoud, Israel and France (L)

Synopsis: Salma, Laila and Nur will never fit in. Palestinians with Israeli citizenship, they choose to live a life of freedom in Tel Aviv, away from their home villages. Each is looking for love, but as young Palestinian women they learn that a relationship of their choosing is not easy to fulfill. They have to choose their place, either in the city or in the village.



Yeon-ae-dam (Our Love Story), Lee Hyun-ju, South Korea (L)

Synopsis: Yoon-ju is a graduate student of fine arts, who works petty part-time jobs to make ends meet and lives at her friend Young-eun’s place for a very small rent. Unlike Young-eun who enjoys having no-strings-attached relationships, Yoon-ju is just not into dating. One day, while she is searching materials for her project, she runs into Ji-soo at a junk shop. Watching Ji-soo in an odd place, Yoon-ju finds herself drawn to her.



Horizontes Latinos

La Región Salvaje (The Untamed), Amat Escalante. Mexico, Denmak, France, Germany, Norway and Switzerland (G)

Synopsis: Young mother Alejandra is a working housewife, raising two boys with her husband Angel in a small city. Her brother Fabien works as a nurse in a local hospital. Their provincial lives are upset with the arrival of the mysterious Veronica. Sex and love can be fragile in certain regions where strong family values, hypocrisy, homophobia and male chauvinism exist. Veronica convinces them that in the nearby woods, inside an isolated cabin, dwells something not of this world that could be the answer to all of their problems



Rara, Pepa San Martín, Chile and Argentina (L)

Synopsis: Since their parents split up, Sara and her younger sister live with their mother, whose new partner is a woman. Everyday life for the four of them is very similar to that of other families. But not everyone sees it that way. Her father in particular has his doubts.



Santa y Andrés, Carlos Lechuga, Cuba, France and Colombia (G)

Synopsis: Cuba, 1983. Santa, a lonely country girl, is sent to keep an eye on Andrés, a gay writer in whom the Revolution has little “confidence”. Gradually these two people, apparently so very different from one another, realize that the things that bring them together are more important than those that separate them.



Zabaltegi-Tabakalera

O Ornitólogo (The Ornithologist), Joao Pedro Rodrigues. Portugal, France and Brazil (G)

Synopsis: Fernando, a solitary ornithologist, is looking for endangered black storks along a remote river in northern Portugal, when he is swept away by the rapids. Rescued by a couple of Chinese pilgrim girls on their way to Santiago de Compostela, he plunges into a dark, eerie forest, trying to get back on track. But as he encounters unexpected and uncanny obstacles and people who put him to the test, Fernando is driven to extreme, transformative actions. Gradually he becomes a different man: inspired, multifaceted, and finally enlightened.



Uncle Howard, Aaron Brookner, UK (G)

Synopsis: Howard Brookner’s first film, Burroughs: The Movie, captured the cultural revolution of downtown New York City in the early ‘80s. Now in a personal journey, his nephew Aaron unearths Howard’s filmmaking legacy and the memory of everything he was.



Out of Competition - Short Films

Velodrome

Kalebegiak (Narciso), Koldo Almandoz. Spain

Short film inside Kalebekiak. Kalebegiak integrates different short films, made by famous bask film makers, all of them dedicated to the city of San Sebastian. Koldo Almandoz, the film director with the highest presence in the short films folder in the history of Kimuak, proposes with “Narciso” a (self)critical look about the city of San Sebastián in a fantasy-science fiction genre story with a touch of humor. In the movie, a man from the future travels to a radiant and lush San Sebastián on year 2016 with a curious purpose which will not be revealed till the end of the film.



International Film Students Meeting

Gabber Lover, Anna Cazenave-Cambet, France (L)

Synopsis: Nérac in the early 2000s. Laurie and Mila, 13 years old, dance on Gabber music, on the shores of a remote lake. Mila is in love with Laurie and she wants to tell her.



O noapte in Tokoriki (A Night in Tokoriki), Roxana Stroe, Romania

Synopsis: In an improvised night club called “Tokoriki” the whole village celebrates Geanina’s 18th birthday. Her boyfriend and Alin will give her a most surprising gift, one that nobody will ever forget.



To check films at San Sebastian official site go here.