Despite not receiving an award at the Cairo International Film Festival for “Miss Brackets,” Spanish Director Sergio Candel expressed his happiness in participating in such an important festival to showcase different schools of cinema.
In an interview with Al-Masry Al-Youm, Candel explained the concepts behind his movie, which tackles conflict between different generations. “We, in Spain, are are still governed by traditions that master the relations between old families. They force the generations not to have affairs before marriage. It tackles intellectual differences between people of different ages through the grandmother, mother and the third generation represented by the son. It was imperative to show difference between the generations through the way of thinking, actions and traditions,” he said.
Portraying the generation conflict, Candel said, took a lot of time, prolonging the filming of the movie.
Candel explained the plot revolves around a woman that is sexually assaulted, which the festival’s audience was receptive to. “Although the movie was extremely hard, I was able to show several aspects of women’s issues. Audience highly reacted to the movie. I noticed women were attending. I could notice that they liked it.”
The piece was filmed over three consecutive years, he said, adding that costs reached 3,000 euros, which is very small in comparison to the film's value. “The small costs are attributed to none of the actors being paid. However, if we count the actual costs including the actors’ shares, it would exceed 180,000 euros,” he added.
Candel expressed disappointment over feeling no rapprochement between Egyptian and Spanish cinemas. “I know nothing about Egyptian cinema. That’s because the US films come on the top in Spain, then come European films, then Latin American. Some people watch Indian films. For Egyptian films, it’s hard to watch it because they do not come to us for many reasons, including translation. It’s not the Egyptian cinema only, but also African.”
Regarding problems that face independent cinema, Candel highlighted costs as the main problem. “It needs high budgets, especially historic movies, for example,” he said indicating that better production is required to promote it internationally. “Free or independent cinema placed itself on the right way, however, it needs more attention to reach the required level.”
Edited translation from Al-Masry Al-Youm
