22/10/2024 - Cadiz will host the world premieres of a dozen Spanish series and also industry activities around platforms, televisions and their creations

Leonor Watling in La vida breve, a series created by Cristóbal Garrido and Adolfo Valor

South International Series Festival will take place from 25 to 31 October, with France as the guest country. Cádiz will also host twelve world premieres and another 15 Spanish premieres during its second edition that aims to improve on last year with 25 industry activities and fifty screenings.

The festival will kick off with La vida breve, a series starring Leonor Watling and Javier Gutiérrez, created by Cristóbal Garrido and Adolfo Valor. It will be followed by This Town (USA/UK), the new work by Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders), directed by Paul Whittington, which tells the story of four young people who want to form a band to escape their depressing neighbourhoods; Asuntos internos, a thriller created by Pedro García Ríos and Rodrigo Martín Antora and set in a police station in Madrid in the 1970s, starring Laia Manzanares, Silvia Abascal and Luis Callejo; and Nautilus (UK), created by James Dormer, centred on the origin of Jules Verne's mythical character Captain Nemo.

This will be followed by the French production Rivages, a fiction created by Jonathan Rio and Monica Rattazzi that tells the case of a scientist sent to her hometown to analyse the reasons behind a mysterious shipwreck; the second season of the Spanish black comedy Muertos S.L., directed by Laura Caballero, which continues to show the day-to-day life of a unique family business on the brink of disaster; the German fiction Oderbruch, directed by Christian Alvart and Adolfo J. Kolmerer, which combines a dark criminal investigation with fantasy genre; and from Portugal Matilha by João Maia, the story of a good-hearted Lisbon criminal who tries to rebuild an honest life with his girlfriend.

Another featured title will be El gran salto, which reconstructs the life story of Spanish Olympic champion Gervasio Deferr and his descent into hell, starring Óscar Casas, created by José Rodríguez and directed by Roger Gual. Another Spanish fiction to be seen in Cádiz is La favorita 1922, a period series based on an original idea by Ramón Campos, Gema R. Neira, Paula Fernández and Curro Serrano and starring Verónica Sánchez, Luis Fernández and Andrea Duro, where the struggle for dreams, love, intrigue and a passion for cooking intertwine.

In the official non-fiction section, the Spanish films Paco de Lucía, flamenco legacy, directed by Antonio Cadenas, which recognises the artist's work in promoting Andalusian culture internationally; the true crime Luz en la oscuridad, directed by Carles Porta and in its second season, where the journalist Carles Porta narrates events that took place in Spain; and Sac. En la mente del criminal, directed by Eduardo López-Jamar, which immerses the audience in the Behavioural Analysis Department of the Spanish Police Force.

Other notable non-fiction titles include Oliver Price's British series Alive: the Andes Plane Disaster, which, through the testimony of survivors, provides the definitive version of the Miracle of the Andes; and On Thin Ice: Putin vs Greenpeace by Chloe Campbell and Alice Mcmahon-Major, about a daring protest on an oil rig.

Cádiz has not only been chosen for the world premiere of the 15th season of La que se avecina, but will also present its Portuguese version, Vizinhos para sempre. Finally, among the special screenings scheduled are the Spanish film Detective Touré, about a Guinean immigrant who makes a living solving cases for his neighbourhood residents, and ¿A qué estás esperando?, an adaptation by David Martín-Porras and Salvador García of Megan Maxwell's bestselling novels.

(Translated from Spanish by Vicky York)