Edurne Azcarate and Eneko Sagardoy are the protagonists of ‘Irati’, an adventure film set in the Middle Ages.
Sitges Festival
The second film by Paul Urkijo from Vitoria has won the Grand Audience Award and special effects at its world premiere at the Catalan festival
‘Irati’ enhances his legend in Sitges. The good reception of the second film by Paul Urkijo in the screenings before the public foreshadowed that the man from Vitoria was not going to leave empty-handed from the great fantastic film festival that is celebrating its 55th edition with the best productions of the genre. And the good expectations have been confirmed with the Basque film because it has won the Grand Audience Award in the official section and the award for Best Special Effects in an announcement made at twelve noon this Saturday by the jury made up of Willian Lustig , Mariana Enríquez, Christophe Mercier, Heidi Honeycutt and Susanne Wuest and Christophe Mercier. In official competition, ‘Corten!’, by Michel Hazanavicius, director known for ‘The Artist’; ‘Piedad, ‘by Eduardo Casanova; and Ti West’s ‘Pearl’.
It is a film that freely adapts the graphic novel ‘El Ciclo de Irati’. Creatures, mythology, traditions are part of a universe that combines darkness and natural light. Eneko Sagardoy is the protagonist along with Edurne Azkarate, from Alava, who gives life to Irati, that mysterious character who gives the film its name. “A love story that leaves a mark and offers the audience an important display of means, with overwhelming visual effects, typical of a high-level production of sword and sorcery”, reviewed the critic Borja Crespo. La Cueva de la Leze is one more character in a film in which the landscape dazzles in a film whose most appropriate label is medieval fantasy adventure. The Castle of Loarre (Huesca) or the caves of Arrikrutz (Oñati) are other prominent locations in the film.
With a budget of 4.3 million euros, it is one of the Basque films with the highest investment, ahead of cinematographic milestones such as ‘Handia’ (3.5 million euros). Within the extensive top-level technical team, David Heras and Jon Serrano, in charge of special effects, have been distinguished.
Paul Urkijo has already presented in Sitges the short film ‘Playing with Death’ (2010) and ‘The Black Forest’ (2014), both starring Txema Blasco, one of the most veteran and recognized actors from Alava. ‘Errementari’ (2017), his coming-out, also had its world premiere at the great event for lovers of the genre. Always with that dead air, a darkness that drinks from mythology and fable around themes such as death, love or power struggles. On this occasion, ‘Irati’ is inspired by the legend of the Irati jungle, to which a supernatural force is attributed to protect the forest. The environmentalists reading is part of the viewers who have extracted from the tape as a message. The premiere in theaters, which was originally scheduled for November 18, has been delayed until February 24.
«In the symbols of mythology we can find lessons for common life and day to day», Urkijo has repeated in the many interviews and meetings with the press. The duo formed by Gorma Gómez Andreu as director of photography and Paul Urkijo has already been recognized with different awards. At the independent Wica festival in Los Angeles, both were awarded for their previous work ‘Dar-Dar’, a black and white short film about a demon that feeds on fingers. That same production received the prestigious Méliès d’Argent.