Among the Spanish films selected for the occasion, Montxo Armend�riz�s �Obaba�, which takes its inspiration from the Basque writer Bernardo Atxaga�s stories, will be responsible for getting things started on 15 September.

 

The other Spanish films selected to be screened in competition have been directed by young filmmakers who will guarantee the next generation of film making: �Sud Express�, by the Salamancans Chema de la Pe�a (1964) and Gabriel Vel�zquez (1968); �Malas temporadas�, by Manuel Mart�n Cuenca of Almer�a (1964); and �Siete v�rgenes�, by the Sevillian Alberto Rodr�guez (1971).

 

Distinguished names from world cinema will come together at the event and compete along with the Spaniards, offering a cinematographic portrayal of modern reality. Some of them are regular festival entrants, others will feature in the competition for the first time.

 

TIDELAND, Terry Gilliam, Great Britain. Terry Gilliam, to whom a retrospective was dedicated in 1998, remains on good form. This year he will screen The Brothers Grimm at the Venice Film Festival, and at the San Sebastian Festival, he will show this adaptation of a �macabre novel� by Mitch Cili, Tideland, featuring a lonely girl who escapes from the reality of her hard life on a farm in Texas by inventing a fantasy world.

 

A COCK AND BULL STORY, Michael Winterbottom, Great Britain.
The prolific British director Michael Winterbottom has also received a complete retrospective of his work at San Sebastian, and last year competed with Nine Songs, which was awarded the Prize for Best Photography. This year he returns with A Cock and Bull Story, a new approach to classic English literature, like that which he has already used in Jude and The Claim, both based on books by Thomas Hardy.

 

DRABET (MANSLAUGHTER), Per Fly, Denmark.
The Danish director Per Fly won the Prize for Best Screenplay in 2003 for Arven (Inheritance), the second part of a trilogy about social classes, of which Baenken (The Bench) (2000) was the first part. If in that film he focussed on the popular classes and in Arven (Inheritance) on the bourgeoisie, Drabet centres on the middle class. It tells the story of a 50-year-old university professor who is in love with a young political activist who finds herself caught up in a situation where a police officer died.