Three films from high profile young Spanish directors - Iciar Bollain, Cesc Gay and Achero Manas - have been selected for the official section of this year's San Sebastian International Film Festival (Sept 18-27).

One other Spanish film will also screen out of competition, while at least two works by new directors will participate in Zabaltegi-New Directors.

A Cannes Critics winner in 1999 for Flowers From Another World, Bollain is competing for the first time at San Sebastian with her third film I Give You My Eyes (Te Doy Mis Ojos ). Starring Laia Marull and Luis Tosar, the story about abused women is written with Alicia Luna.

Gay, who came to prominence with Krampack in 2000, is also competing for the first time in the Official Section with his third film, In The City (En La Ciudad). The Catalan director's film is a generational tale portraying a group of 30-year-old friends from a harsh, highly unconventional point of view. Chisco Amado, Alex Brendemühl, Eduard Fernandez, Mònica Lopez, Vicenta N'Dongo, Maria Pujalte and Leonor Watling star.

Goya winner for Pellet (El Bola) Achero Manas returns to compete at San Sebastian with November (Noviembre) about a provocative street theatre group. Narrated documentary-style, alternating between interviews with veteran actors talking about their past in an avant-garde theatre group, the film is a combination of street scenes and up-to-the-minute political reflections. It stars a cast of young actors headed by Ingrid Rubio and Oscar Jaenada.

Participating in the Official Section, but not in competition, is the latest film by Gerardo Herrero, El Misterio Galindez. Based on the novel of the same name by Manuel Vazquez Montalban, the film stars Saffron Burrows, Harvey Keitel, Eduard Fernandez and Guillermo Toledo and is about the strange disappearance of a Basque politician during his American exile in 1956.

Meanwhile, in the Zabaltegi new directors strand, screen and thriller-story writer Juan Madrid makes his directorial debut with an adaptation of his book Tanger, published in 1997.


Patxi Barco, a Basque TV and theatre actor and director, who participated in Zabaltegi 1998 with his short Pase Negro, also makes his feature film debut with El Final De La Noche, a harsh, violent tale set around a woman, Rakel, played by the young actress Itziar Ituno as she investigates a murky crime dating back five years to the same day on which her husband was run over by a junkie.


The films Noviembre (November), Tanger and El Final de la Noche are eligible for the Altadis-New Directors award carrying Euros 120,000 .