59th THESSALONIKI INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL [1-11/11/2018] || 1-11/11/2018
Jaime Rosales Press Conference
The 59th Thessaloniki International Film Festival welcomed the Spanish film director Jaime Rosales, whom honors this year with a tribute to his work. The filmmaker gave a press conference on Saturday November 3, 2018 in the Thessaloniki Museum of Photography, moderated by TIFF’s head of international program Yorgos Krassakopoulos.
One of the most important representatives of the new Spanish cinema, constantly present in the Cannes Film Festival and with a very personal style, Rosales creates wonderful images, perfectly framed, that focus on these moments when we don’t want to be seen. The 59th TIFF tribute presents his six feature films, among which his latest, Petra.
During the press conference, the filmmaker spoke about his love for Greece. “The Greek civilization is very important to me. I studied Greek philosophy for a year. Yesterday, as I was still on the plane watching your mountains, your seas, I was wondering how Plato and Sophocles’ country might look like. People are very warm here, just like the Spanish. This weather of Thessaloniki, the mist, is wonderful for shooting. That’s why Theo Angelopoulos was making his films here.
Speaking on the way that he makes films, Jaime Rosales noted, among others: “I make films to discover myself. I don’t consider myself such a good director. I look like Sisyphus. I’m trying to reach the top and then start all over again. Yet, each film is an opportunity for me to explore the film language. In my film Solitary Fragments (La Soledad) for instance, 40% of the scenes are shot split screen, while Petra was shot with steady cam that sometimes gets close to the characters, sometimes not”.
What is his relationship with the audience? As to this question, the filmmaker said: “My films, though personal and dealing with topics I’m interested in, are made with the purpose to be seen. The audience is not my friend, it is my enemy in the sense that they won’t forgive me if I do something they don’t like, since they spend time and money on a film. When my film Solitary Fragments was screened in Cannes, it was a disaster. By all accounts, neither the audience nor the critics liked it. Yet I received a message by someone saying that this film changed his life”.
On his latest film, Petra, Jaime Rosales said among others: “I wanted it to make a wider impact. To reveal what I consider important. Have a novel look. The script is more intense and I’m working with talented actors. Actors are weird. I admire and find it hard to handle them. I’m trying to use many techniques because every actor is different. I usually make a lot of rehearsals with them”.
