🚀 go-pugleaf

I've enjoyed the discussion so far, despite the contention. It does seem that
there is some euskaldun identification with the festival so i shall write to
the Sydney reporter and prompt him to make more recognition of the Basque
element. Perhaps some of you could host him while he is in Donostia and extend
his education - take him to a sagardotegi, eh!
In terms of cinema in euskara it is a great shame that there is not more. The
history of EH is so rich and countries like Australia and NZ have produced
successful movies that have fascinated the world. I suspect that you don't
have the writers who feel confident about weaving a story around the life of
important historical figures.  Beyond that there are many successful movies on
contemporary life from countries all over the world. There is no reason that
euskaldunak can't draw from their experiences of human tragedy to produce
great cinema. I suspect they need to believe in themselves a little more. Back
in the early 1990s a film was released in euskara about a young woman engineer
who loses her job because she supports an ETA prisoner, who I think is her
brother or boyfriend, then  she  has to return to home to live with her
family/friends. I thought the film was great. Can anyone tell me the name? I'm
a little hazy on the plot so my recounting here may not be quite correct.
 I know that in the USA foreign films have a hard time but that is not true in
other parts of the world. Here in australia we have a TV station which shows
dominantly foreign language films and in any one week i could see films in at
least 10 different languages. The station is an active promoter of quality
films no matter the origin and they do a lot of the sub-titling themsleves.
Certainly films and documentaries and series would all be shown here if they
were of sufficient quality.
Jon


    Date:       Thu, 1 Oct 1998 06:17:57 -0400
    From:       Luistxo Fernandez <nabigatzen@JALGI.COM>

    nko-k:

    >luistxo writes:
    >
    >>>>The problem is not about the festival being Basque
    >or not. The fact is that there is nothing like
    >Basque-language cinema, and what some may call
    >Basque cinema is no more than Spanish cinema with
    >some people involved born around here.<<<
    >
    >   you didn't think twice before you
    >   wrote this, did you?

    Yes, I did.

    1. There is nothing like Basque-language cinema. Only some attempts from
    time to time. That is a fact.
    2. Medem, Calparsoro, Alex de la Iglesia, Imanol Uribe... These people make
    Spanish cinema. Good cinema, perhaps. What's the Basqueness about them?
    They were born around here. More or less as with the films where Alfredo
    Landa appears. Landa's films are shit and the others are good? But that has
    nothing to do with Basqueness or not.

    listen, many basque film directors
    >   ( perhaps to you, born around there? )
    >   have made good movies. some of these,
    >   offer the spectator a glimpse of what the
    >   life in e.h is. perhaps there's another
    >   basque country, may be in your ideas, or
    >   dreams, but i saw on the big screen some
    >   of the life that actually happens in e.h.

    I missed those films, obviously. Can you give me examples?
    Take Montxo Armendariz: a couple of films located in Navarre. That makes
    "Historias del Kronen" a basque film?

    >   since i was born around there, and i
    >   probably do not know what the basque
    >   movie is, would you please explain?
    >   don't mind if you do it in chinese.

    Jakin ezkero, txinoz egingo banizu, susmatzen dut ez zenidakeela ulertuko,
    nko. Badirudi horrekin adierazi nahi duzula berdin dizula zer azaltzen
    dizudan, berdin dizula ulertu edo ez ulertu, nire arrazoi, argudio edo
    iritziek ez dizutela inporta... Ez nau gehiegi mintzen, baina horrela
    eztabaidatzen hasita, jai.

    This finnally will lead us to the discussion we had some months ago, about
    Pio Baroja being a Basque writer or a Spanish writer.

    Luistxo

Jon
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