Between this April and next May, two of the most important festivals take place in Madrid for discovering new short-film production. After Málaga and Medina, it is now time to focus on the Semana del Cortometraje de la Comunidad de Madrid and Documenta Madrid. Between both competitions, a total of 42 Spanish short films have been selected.
In the case of the Semana del Cortometraje, the 30 shorts that received project grants in 2016 will be screened. Although some of them are not strictly national premieres, it does mark the festival-circuit debut for most of them. The Week begins on April 24 and ends on the 30th.
This is the full list of short films:
Official Selection – Semana del Cortometrajes
- 16 Semanas, Carlota Coronado
- Acogida, Gaizka Urresti
- Adivina, Gonzaga Manso
- Alicia, Daniel M. Caneiro
- Australia, Lino Escalera
- Defuncionario, Wiro Berriatúa
- Distrito paraiso, Eduardo Cardoso
- El fracaso, Daniel Remon
- El hombrecillo de papel, Elena del Moral
- El traje de superman, Juan Manuel Díaz
- Ensayo de vida, María Reyes Arias
- Funky Lola, Julio Mas Alcaraz
- II, Belén Herrera De La Osa
- La invitada, Grojo
- We Saw Them Laugh and Thought It Was Happiness, Vermut
- Los amantes de la página par, Juan Bros
- Los invitados siempre vuelven, Diego Sabanés
- Mother, Rodrigo Sorogoyen
- Madres de luna, Alicia Albares
- Miss Wamba, Estefanía Cortés
- Nevada, Javier Kühn
- Not Even with the Petal of a Rose, Cristina Linares Triviño
- Not a Single Line, Víctor E.D. Somoza
- Pensamientos, Juan Molano and Jesús Monroy
- Pink Spring in Brazil, Mario de la Torre
- Sisyphus, Cristina Guisado García
- Tabib, Carlo D’Ursi
- Vacío, Sergio Martínez
- Vampire, Álex Montoya
- Life and Death of Jennifer Rockwell, Javier Roldán
The following week, Documenta Madrid begins, a festival devoted entirely to documentary cinema, taking place from May 4 to 14. This year, a competitive section has been created exclusively for the Spanish short film, and, as with the Semana del Corto, there is no strict premiere requirement.
Despite this, many of the short films screened are premieres, and it is also a very important section for taking the pulse of the most recent Spanish documentary short film.
In total, 12 short films have been selected:
Selection of Spanish short films at Documenta Madrid
- El mundanal ruido, David Muñoz López
- Cucli, Xavier Marrades
- Tigger!, Iban Del Campo
- El becerro pintado, David Pantaleón
- The Fourth Kingdom, Álex Lora Cercos and Adán Aliaga
- Cabeza de orquídea, Violeta Blasco, Germán López, Carlotta Napolitano, Angélica SáNchez, Claudia Zegarra
- Dies de festa, Clara Martínez Malagelada
- Andrekale, María Ibaretxe and Alaitz Arenzana
- Sub terrae, Nayla Sanz Fuentes
- 25 Cines/Seg, Luis Macías
- Kafeneio, Nuria Giménez Lorang
- I Don’t Speak Romanian, Rocío Montaño
Participation in both the Semana del Corto and Documenta Madrid affects festival distribution, as it counts as the national and world premiere, but not the international premiere. This small nuance is important, as there are cases of selections at Spanish festivals that do count as the international premiere.
Some festivals define as an international premiere those participations in international sections, even if they take place in the film’s country of origin. Therefore, a Spanish film that takes part in an international section at a festival in Spain would also have its international premiere there.
Therefore, in the case of these two Madrid festivals, as they are national competitions, the short films still retain their international premiere. But not the world premiere, which is the first time a film is screened anywhere in the world. It is important to understand these differences, as there are festivals such as Venice that require a world premiere for short films. In addition, there are other festivals that value it, even if it is not a strict requirement.
Whether your short is selected in any of these competitions or not, it is important that you understand these nuances well and can prepare your distribution strategy properly.
Little by little, we are getting to know the new national production at the different festivals held in the first half of the year.
Best of luck to all those selected!