12/11/2025 - Adrián Canoura’s debut feature blends family archive and experimentation in a poetic portrait of solitude, memory and the intergenerational bond

The film We Were Left Alone [+see also:
trailer
film profile] by Galician filmmaker Adrián Canoura will have its world premiere at IDFA – International Documentary Filmfestival Amsterdam (13-23 November), screening in the Luminous section, after which it will vie for the Best First Feature Award and the FIPRESCI Award. The movie charts an intimate journey between the filmmaker and his father on board a fishing boat bound for the Grand Sole fishing grounds. The director embarks not only on a physical voyage, but also on an emotional and sensorial one, to understand the seafaring life, the passing down of the trade and the silences that inhabit their relationship.

In the director’s own words, “This film is born of a need to look back, towards my father and towards the sea that separated us and brought us together at the same time. Through archive and experimentation, I seek to understand how time and territory shape our identity, and how silence can be a form of dialogue,” he concludes.

Canoura is an artist whose work encompasses cinema, video art and music. He has collaborated with artists such as Baiuca, Sen Senra and Guitarricadelafuente, and has directed shorts such as Da morte nace a vida and Rexistros, as well as the medium-length flick Caerán lóstregos do ceo, rewarded at Filmadrid. In 2025, the Curtocircuíto festival dedicated the Terra Focus to him and hosted the audiovisual show Sirāt Live Soundtrack AV, together with Óliver Laxe and musician Kangding Ray, revolving around the former’s award-winning film Sirāt [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Óliver Laxe
film profile]. His work explores memory, territory and identity through essay, archive and experimentation, combining his auteur output with live visual direction for the Baiuca music project.

We Were Left Alone was produced by Felipe Lage Coro, of Zeitun Films (You All Are Captains [+see also:
trailer
film profile], Mimosas [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Oliver Laxe
film profile], Red Moon Tide [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Lois Patiño
film profile]). With a screenplay by Canoura and Aldara Pagán, cinematography by Arancha Brandón, editing by Iria Silvosa, and sound design and music by Anxo R Ferreira, it received support from the Xunta de Galicia – AGADIC, and features the participation of TVG and OPP-7 in Burela. Spanish distribution is handled by La Machina.

Check out our exclusive trailer below:

(Translated from Spanish)