2 months ago
Spanish character Itsaso Arana proves that “Girls Are Alright” pinch her directorial debut, vying for nan Crystal Globe astatine Karlovy Vary Film Festival.
Known to nan festival’s assemblage acknowledgment to Jonás Trueba’s “August Virgin,” which she besides co-wrote, she is presently readying their adjacent project, group to sprout successful nan autumn.
“That experience, arsenic good arsenic his different films I starred in, person been profoundly important successful my life. Jonás is simply a awesome inspiration,” says Arana. But aft years of collaborations, nevertheless satisfying, she is fresh to task retired connected her own.
“I person ever created collectively aliases successful a partnership, and I needed to beryllium to myself I was tin of starring a project. For amended aliases worse, it’s mine,” she says, calling nan process “healing.”
“I consciousness for illustration acting, penning and directing, astatine slightest arsenic I acquisition it, are portion of nan aforesaid thing. These are each forms of look I need, they make my life meaningful. And that’s what our clip present is each about, right?”
Arana, who spent her profession navigating betwixt cinema and theater, decided to harvester nan 2 besides successful nan film. Showing a group of women (Bárbara Lennie, Irene Escolar, Itziar Manero, Helena Ezquerro and Arana herself) heading to a distant location successful nan countryside to rehearse a play and braving nan power successful their elaborate costumes.
“I person been doing it for much than half my life, but acting is still 1 of nan astir fascinating and mysterious jobs I know. I was willing successful sharing that knowledge and my questions [about it] pinch different actresses,” she says.
In her “summer film” – produced by Los ilusos films and sold by Bendita Film Sales – they activity together but besides stock individual stories.
“What scares us, what embarrasses america aliases what makes america uncertainty ourselves is nan astir valuable point we have, arsenic agelong arsenic we are emotion heard. That’s precisely nan move that willing me, 1 wherever renewed spot comes straight from their shared fragility.”
She besides plays pinch nan mean itself, pinch her formed breaking nan 4th wall by staring correct into nan camera. “It was basal that nan actresses would return complete nan film,” she says. “It doesn’t break nan illusion, I think. It really renews this ‘pact’ betwixt cinema and nan viewer. Also, actresses perpetually unrecorded in-between reality and fiction. We person a very beardown consciousness of looking astatine ourselves from nan outside.”
Is it a bully infinitesimal for stories astir women, made by women? Arana hopes so.
“There is nary uncertainty that this caller consciousness of nan feminine has awakened nan world, but we mustn’t return a measurement back,” she says. Underlining that showing female relationships based connected relationship and communal trust, not conflict, was crucial.
“It’s a wealth to person a bully friend, to person a sister. Actresses – and women successful wide – person been wholly enslaved by nan antheral gaze, a regard that made america judge we should compete pinch each other. Let’s extremity believing that story.”
