The ‘Focus on Catalonia’ section is curated by Vincenzo Bugno, with the support of Isona Admetlla Font and Ricardo Apilánez, and focuses on a film culture characterised by a passion for formal experimentation, strong filmmakers, and a unique interplay between documentary, fiction and experimental forms. This project has been made possible thanks to the support of Acción Cultural Española (AC/E) and the contribution of the Spanish Embassy in Italy.
For the past four years, the BFFB has been paying particular attention to regions whose complex identities resonate in some way with the history and cultural reality of South Tyrol. The focus is often on border regions or cultural landscapes with multi-layered identities, multilingual societies and historical tensions. Catalonia embodies many of these aspects. The region possesses a strong cultural and linguistic identity, a language spoken by millions of people, a vibrant economic structure and an extremely productive cultural scene that has gained significant international visibility.
“Giving space to Catalan cinema therefore also means engaging with one of Europe’s most active film regions, both in terms of production dynamics and international cooperation strategies. A particular focus of the section is on hybrid documentary film production, which has grown significantly in recent years and has also been fostered by the educational work of numerous institutions and film schools in Catalonia. Many of the selected works deliberately straddle the boundaries between documentary, fiction and experimental practice, thereby expanding the possibilities of cinematic narrative forms.” emphasises Vincenzo Bugno, artistic director of the Bolzano Film Festival Bozen.
The programme presents seven films that represent this universe particularly impressively. These include works by Andrés Duque, Virginia García del Pino, José Luis Guerin and Neus Ballús, which open up different perspectives on documentary storytelling. In Carelia: Internacional con Monumento, Andrés Duque travels to the Finnish-Russian border and explores a landscape where shamanic traditions, folklore and the traumatic traces of the Stalinist purges converge. Virginia García del Pino’s La estafa del amor combines a reading, a discussion and cinematic reflection into a multi-layered exploration of romantic love, deception and the role of cinema in the construction of desire and emotion. José Luis Guerin’s Historias del Buen Valle takes us to the outskirts of Barcelona, to the Vallbona district, where, amidst gardens, railway lines and motorways, a poetic panorama of everyday life unfolds, alongside a quiet resistance to urban and social change. In I tuttofare (Sis dies corrents), Neus Ballús accompanies three plumbers on their daily rounds in Barcelona, painting a sensitive portrait of work, migration and coexistence in the city with documentary precision and humour. Also in the programme is Albert Serra’s film Pomeriggi di Solitudine (Tardes de soledad), a haunting portrait of star bullfighter Andrés Roca Rey, which observes the controversial tradition of bullfighting through a visual language that is both fascinating and unsettling. Montse Triola, producer of the film and co-producer of Magalhães, will also be present in Bolzano for the screening of Pomeriggi di solitudine.
Carla Simón is also represented with her new film Romería, which is being shown in the festival’s competition, thereby underlining the creative strength of Catalan film production. The internationally acclaimed director is known for her sensitive cinema, which intertwines intimate family stories with questions of memory and origin. Romería centres on 18-year-old Marina, who travels to Galicia to obtain her grandparents’ signatures for a scholarship. Surrounded by a family largely unknown to her, old tensions, hidden memories and unresolved questions about her deceased parents come to the surface as she begins to piece together the fragmented stories of her origins. The lead actor Mitch Martín will be a guest at the festival and will attend the event.
Over time, an increasing number of films have emerged, including from outside Europe, thanks in part to the commitment of Catalan institutions: as a wonderful example of this, we are screening Magalhães by the Filipino director Lav Diaz, who tells the story of Ferdinand Magellan’s expedition as an epic and critical portrait of colonial conquest.
Among the festival’s guests is also Marta Andreu, producer, curator and lecturer, as well as one of the defining voices of contemporary Catalan documentary film. As part of the focus, she will present the performance Lovesong, a non-existent film in progress at Club 3 on the first Sunday afternoon. The starting point is an attempt at a cinematic portrait of the Catalan poet Lala Blay, which Andreu began twenty years ago and left unfinished. As fragments of the footage from that time appear, she reads a personal text and develops an essayistic monologue on memory, loss and the relationship with images. Lala Blay will also be present at the event in Bolzano. Admission is free.
To delve deeper into the world of Catalan cinema, the festival invites you to the Waaghaus on 13 April 2026 at 5 pm for the talk Focus Catalonia: The Allure of the Contemporary. Languages, Boundaries and the Challenge of Reality, moderated by Vincenzo Bugno and Isona Admetlla Font. Guests include director Andrés Duque, whose film Carelia Internacional con Monumento is featured in the programme, producer Alba Lombardía for José Luis Guerin’s Historias del Buen Valle, and producer and lecturer Marta Andreu.
Guests from the Focus section who will be attending the 2026 festival:
Marta Andreu, producer and lecturer
Lala Blay, poet
Isona Admetlla Font
Alba Lombardía, producer of Historias del Buen Valle by José Luis Guerin
Montse Triola, producer of Pomeriggi di solitudine and co-producer of Magalhães.
