In Those Lands
Synopsis
Those lands mentioned in the title of this short belong to the people who once inhabited them, who live there now and who will one day occupy them. Here the relationships between man and nature, violence and culture, the divine and the material, change and permanence, are condensed.
Press
Director’s Notes
I started this project when I was taking a course with the Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. The idea came to me from a line by the Galician poet Álvaro Cunqueiro, who, when reflecting on the origins of the apple in the Far East, said that “all fruit tastes better when one knows its history.”
Whenever I arrive to a place I try to discover or understand what might have happened there, however humdrum it may have been. And so, that’s why I engaged with this lemon grove in the south of Spain and tried to think about the arrival of this fruit to the Iberian Peninsula thanks to the Arabs, back in the eight century. Then, starting out from this idea, a whole series of unexpected events took place during the filming that forced me to rethink the way in which we were taught about the Reconquest in school and to reconfirm, as Walter Benjamin pointed out, that “there is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism.”
In this short, I used a poetic language to reflect on the complex construction of our identities and how we receive our inheritance and our tradition, in these fascinating times of upheaval in which the term globalization is so common.
I am very critical, both in philosophical and political terms, with the idea of strong identity, no matter what kind it is. From my point of view, there are no monolithic identities even though defending them often functions as a highly partisan mechanism for social cohesion. I believe more in singularities: a language, a place, a shared history, that makes us different as collectives. I believe that recognising oneself in a “essential identity” is a highly dangerous and biased cultural construct.
I understand reality more as a set of relationships that are in continuous flux, change and interaction.
Downloadable materials
Download poster, dossier, stills, trailer, synopsis and film data sheet.
Awards
- Best Short Film Award – Official Selection
10.º IBAFF. Festival Internacional de Cine de Murcia, 2019
Official Selections
International
- 24.º International Environmental film festival “Green Vision”, International Competition, Saint Petersburg, Russia, 2019
- Shortcutz Lisboa – Best of Olhares, Lisboa, Portugal, 2019
- 3.º Bendita Tú Festival de Cine Realizado por Mujeres, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2019
- 5.º Festival Internacional de Cine y Video Kayche’ Tejidos Visuales, Mérida y Yucatán, México, 2019
- 6.º Olhares do Mediterrâneo – Cinema no Feminino, Lisboa, Portugal, 2019
- 3.º Black Canvas Contemporary Film Festival, Ciudad de México, Mexico, 2019
- FNNH 2019 – Filmová noc na hrade / Film night at the castle, Veľký Šariš, Slovakia, 2019
- AtlantikLights, Berlin, Germany, 2019
- 19.º Festival Internacional De Cortometrajes Cine A La Calle, Barranquilla, Colombia, 2019
- 21.º Ismailia Film Festival, Ismailia, Egypt, 2019
- International Film Festival in Fez, Fez, Morocco, 2019
- Prospe(c)tiva/B.r.i.o., San Giorgio del Sannio, Italy, 2018
National
- 48.º Festival Internacional de Cine de Cartagena, Cartagena, 2019
- 3.º Festivales en corto, Alicante, 2019
- 5.º Directed by Women Spain, Barcelona, Madrid, Sevilla, Murcia and Palma de Mallorca, 2019
- 7.º Rural FilmFest, Mancomunitat de L’Alcoià i el Comtat. Valencia, 2019
- 34.º Cinema Jove – Festival Internacional de Cine de Valencia, Valencia, 2019
- 21.º Festival Internacional de Cine Medioambiental de Canarias, Garachico, Tenerife, 2019
- 19.º Festival Internacional de Cine de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas, 2019
- 10.º IBAFF. Festival Internacional de Cine de Murcia, Murcia, 2019
- 6.º Tenerife Shorts, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 2018
- 8.ª Muestra de Cine de Lanzarote, Arrecife, 2018
- 48 ALCINE, Divergencias, Alcalá de Henares, 2018
- 14.ª Muestra de Cortometrajes San Rafael en Corto, Santa Lucía, Gran Canaria, 2018
- 25 l’Alternativa, Panorama, Barcelona, 2018
- 15.º DocumentaMadrid 2018. Festival Internacional de Cine Documental, Madrid, 2018
Special Screenings
- SOCO – Sesión de Cortos Canarios, Asociación Atlas, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 2020
- Conversation Night, Albany Park Autonomous Center, Chicago, United States, 2020
- CUNY (City University of New York), New York, United States, 2020
- International Film Forum, Weitz Center for Creativity, Carleton College, Northfield, United States, 2020
- Casa Árabe, cinema programme, Córdoba y Madrid, 2019
- Taller de vídeo participado, La Vorágine / Cultura Crítica, Santander, 2019
- Cineclub Chaplin Cuenca, Cuenca, 2019
- Digital 104 Film Distribution Selection, Espacio Aguerre Cultural, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 2018
Technical Information
Direction, Script, Photography and Editing
Nayra Sanz Fuentes
Production
Javier Sanz Fuentes and Nayra Sanz Fuentes
Image Postproduction
Sergio Hernández
Color
Andrés de la Cruz
Sound Postproduction
Sergio López-Eraña
Running time
12’
Production Company
Rinoceronte Films S. L.