The most ambitious Cerdanya Film Festival raises the curtain

PuigcerdáWith The unfixing, by Emmy-winning director Nicole Betancourt, present at the premiere, opened the 16th edition of the Cerdanya Film Festival (CFF). The unfixing It premiered at the Ji.hlava International Documentary Film Festival in the Czech Republic and won the Audience Award at the Vermont Film & Folklore Festival. The documentary offers an intimate and poetic look at grief and healing as gateways to a new way of seeing and experiencing the world, and also reflects on climate change and the state of the planet. It is a co-production between the United States and Spain, by the Girona-based production company Horizontal Films Media. It was filmed over eight years in the United States, Spain, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic, with post-production completed entirely in Barcelona.

This was the starting gun for an ambitious program of up to 250 short and feature films (160 in the previous edition) selected from the 3,000 films received. This year's opening ceremony also featured a cast of personalities such as Álvaro Cervantes, the lead actor in the well-known film Deaf, and Gerard Oms, director of the film Very far.

The quality of the films shown at the CFF, consolidated as hub The audiovisual industry at the Spanish, Catalan, Andorran, and French levels is the common denominator of this year's edition. An edition in which the number of feature films has doubled (from twenty last year to 42) and which also boasts a luxury lineup and the best films of the year, some of which will not be released until autumn in theaters. This is the case of the preview of Heidi: The Lynx Rescue, inspired by the classic story by Johanna Spyri and directed by Toby Schwarz and Aizea Roca Berridi (a co-production between Germany, Spain and Belgium) and which opens in theaters on August 22, presents proposals presented at different reference festivals and national and international premieres of short films. CFF director, Jordi Forcada, highlights the success achieved so far: "We have raised and consolidated a professional and relevant project for the audiovisual sector for Cerdanya, for the Pyrenees and the cross-border region, of great cultural, artistic, industrial and tourist interest"

Other films that will be screened at the festival are A like from Bob Trevino, irreverent American comedy directed by Tracie Laymon; A Portuguese villa, written and directed by Avelina Prat and a major revelation at the Malaga Film Festival; the rural drama What remains of you, by Gala Gracia; the Latin American and Spanish co-production Ramón and Ramón, by Salvador del Solar; The Turtles, by Belén Funes; Sirado, by Oliver Laxe (winner of the 2025 Cannes Jury Prize and film of the summer); Detective Conan: One-eyed flashback, new installment of this successful Japanese anime; The most precious merchandise, a dramatic and animated film by Michel Hazanavicius (The Artist); The Return of Ulysses, a historical drama by Uberto Pasolini, in preview; The irresponsibles, directed by Laura Mañá; Breakfast with me, directed by Iván Morales, and Diamanti, an Italian comedy-drama film directed by Ferzan Ozpetek, among many others.

With the aim of continuing to position cinema in one of the most prominent places in Ceretà culture, the festival is running for six more days than last year. This is a way to continue offering more films following the closure and demolition of the Cine Avenida. The films will be screened in the Casino Ceretà theater.

Seven film music concerts

The CFF has also made a commitment to promoting film music this year, with a series of seven concerts to strengthen the film-music partnership in the cross-border region of the Catalan, Spanish, French, and Andorran Pyrenees, featuring renowned orchestras. Among them are those of the Vallès Symphony Orchestra (OSV), one entitled Kubrick's music, and a second under the title Movie heroes; apart from that of organist Juan de la Rubia, who will offer Faust of Murnau with improvisations on the organ that will provide the soundtrack to the film screening Splendor (1926). That film, in particular, will be subtitled in Catalan. These concerts aim to promote the film-music partnership in the cross-border region of the Catalan, Spanish, French, and Andorran Pyrenees.