After 16 years at the helm of the San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF) José Luis Rebordinos is ready for his final edition.
He will hand the baton to former co-deputy director Maialen Beloki on January 1.
The world premiere of Fatih Akin’s Ghost Song, opens the festival tonight, September 19.
Rebordinos talks to Screen about the decline in films by women directors in the competition, the importance the festival places on Spanish and Latin American cinema, and what he believes was the before-and-after moment for the US studios at film festivals.
What are you hoping to achieve with your final edition?
I don’t think anybody believes me when I say, for me, this is an edition like any other. But I am sure it will also feel quite emotional. I took the decision to leave two years ago. After 31 years at the festival, I feel it’s time to go and try something new, but I will also slow down a bit.
How do you believe San Sebastian has evolved under your management?
Our team has put the spotlight on the industry, expanding its presence at the festival through the Europe-Latin America Co-Production Forum and the Creative Investors’ Conference. Over time, this has increased the number of industry professionals coming to San Sebastian from 600 to over 2.400.
We are not a market, but we have become a festival where business deals are made, where films are bought and funds invest in films. We have also expanded the festival’s scope to an all-year-round event through our ties to the city’s film school and our residency and mentoring programmes.
I am also very proud of the work we have done with the festival’s archive, restoring and digitising 74 years of San Sebastian’s history.
Over the years you have put a lot of emphasis on the presence of Spanish and Latin American cinema throughout the festival. What can we expect this year?
There are three Spanish and three Latin American productions in competition this year.
International distributors and producers have a great interest in San Sebastian and trust our festival as a window into what’s going on in Spain. They enquire about the films selected, but they also ask for our advice about projects in development.
There is an interest in Spanish cinema that I had never witnessed before. This year there were three Spanish films in competition in Cannes, with Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s The Beloved, Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s La Bola Negra and Pedro Almodóvar’s Bitter Christmas, which had never happened before.
The fact that there was only one film in competition in Venice directed by a woman was much discussed. What has your experience been when selecting this year’s competition titles?
There are four films in competition directed by women, fewer than in other editions. We do not work with quotas, and I feel this year we have seen fewer titles directed by women that we liked. When we analyse the data of this edition, I am curious to see if we have seen fewer films directed by women or if we selected fewer in relation to the submissions we got.
Has it become more difficult to attract Hollywood films to festivals?
There is certainly a before-and-after moment: the premiere of Joker: Folie À Deux in Venice in 2024, which didn’t work. The fact that a film like One Battle After Another did well without a festival launch also led [US studios] to rethink their strategy. On the other hand, companies like A24 and platforms like Netflix, Mubi and Movistar Plus are increasingly interested in festivals. Streamers are aware that with so many films being made, festivals operate as curators.
How do you measure the success of the Creative Investors’ Conference, which brings in top international execs to talk and meet with the Spanish sector?
The fact this has resulted in specific agreements being made is the best proof of success. The guests who come are key figures in the industry, and this attracts the presence of many more professionals. We have full support from the Spanish government, and the €500,000 direct grant to strengthen SSIFF’s industry programme announced this month will not only help the industry activities in the future, but it also shows we are going in the right direction.
What direction do you think your successor, Maialen Beloki, might take the festival?
As one of the deputy directors, she knows the festival she has a deep knowledge of the industry and will envision the future of the festival. I think it will be an evolution more than a revolution.
What have been your personal highlights in the role?
When Bono gave Penélope Cruz her Donostia Award in 2019, as it was a surprise for her. On a different note, I will never forget the edition we did during the Covid pandemic in 2020. Making the decision to go ahead was the toughest I have had to make as the head of San Sebastian.
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