4:21 PM
indigo
Just finished watching the opening ceremony at the official site which I found more interesting than last year mainly because it was faster and had clips of ALL films in the different sections that comprise the fest.Still, there were some awkward moments like presenters that didn’t say a word, like John Malkovich and too many languages without translation to a more common language than very hard Basque. The last comment is most important when I don’t speak nor understand Basque -even when my last name root comes exactly from that region- and wanted to understand what they were saying while the multiple clips were screened; but probably tonight will watch the ceremony again as TVE will broadcast surely with subtitles or dubbed. But then, this is exactly what I like from European festivals, the huge diversity of films, the colorful characters and the many languages in the screen and outside of movie theaters.
The most interesting part of the ceremony are obviously the movie clips and from watching I got interested in several films, so probably will check every day to see what the fest has and maybe will do a daily short coverage. Also the fest and/or opening ceremony theme was “opening doors” so there was a nice collage of films from all over with opening doors scenes plus the ceremony stage had doors that opened constantly.
The ceremony was opened with the FIPRESCI Grand Prix and Olivia Williams receiving the award in the name of Roman Polanski.
To watch the opening ceremony at the official site go here, go down to San Sebastian Festival TV, click the Ceremonies tab, select the Opening Ceremony video and a window will pop-up.
So the most famous Spanish and Spanish-speaking festival in the world has started and soon we will learn what this edition has in store for films in the different competitions.
Cheers!!!
To close here is Olivia Williams with the FIPRESCI Grand Prix.
