Impuros

An attempt to create a bridge between the different political positions that coexist, sometimes violently, in the Basque Country, in northern Spain.

An in-depth interview with José Antonio Urrutikoetxea, known as Josu Ternera, one of the most relevant leaders of the terrorist gang ETA.

The chronicle of the process, ten long years, that led to the end of ETA (Euskadi Ta Askatasuna), a Basque terrorist gang that perpetrated robberies, kidnappings and murders in Spain and the French Basque Country for more than fifty years. Almost 1,000 people died, but others are still alive to tell the story of how the nightmare finally ended.

Kukutza III was a gaztetxe (self-managed social centre) in the neighbourhood of Rekalde, Bilbao. It was occupied in 1998, and it was evicted by the police in 2011. The documentary shows some activities that were hosted by the gaztetxe.

An in-depth investigation into how violence, any kind of violence, has affected and is affecting the inhabitants of Oiartzun, in Guipúzcoa, Basque Country, Spain, where Basque nationalism, the abertzale left and the atrocious terrorism of the criminal gang ETA have cursed and destroyed lives for decades…

Departing from peripheral details of some paintings of the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, a female narrator unravels several stories related to the economic, social and psychological conditions of past and current artists.

Documentary about the court martial held following the assassination of Melitón Manzanas, commissioner of the Political-Social Brigade of Guipúzcoa, in an attack carried out by ETA on August 2, 1968. The film includes a series of interviews and testimonies from those imprisoned and prosecuted in that court martial. Following the attack, a state of emergency was declared in Guipúzcoa and hundreds of people were arrested.

In a temple in Thailand, an order of Buddhist monks are performing a ceremony for people who headed there to get re-incarnated. There, we meet Tarn, a young Thai woman who lived in the Basque Country some years ago and who is still fascinated with that region, food and culture.

Documentary about anchovy fishermen in San Sebastian

San Sebastian, Basque Country, Spain, June 27, 1960. A bomb explodes at the Amara train station. Begoña, a child of only twenty months, dies a few hours later as a result of the injuries sustained in the attack.

The relatives of the victims of the terrorist gang ETA speak of their suffering, their fear, their loneliness; of the systematic oblivion to which they are subjected by Basque society, both by those who remain silent and look the other way and by those who, accomplices of the criminals, share their repugnant ideology and celebrate extortion, kidnapping and murder, thus contributing to perpetuating a bloody reign of terror.

A young journalist travels to the Basque Country to meet with those responsible for the murders committed by the terrorist group ETA and their ideological accomplices. On his journey, he interviews repentant terrorists, those responsible for crimes who are now integrated into their communities, and those convicted of terrorism who now hold positions as mayors, parliamentarians, or university professors, to hear their explanations about their past links to the ultra-nationalist network and to find out what mark terrorism has left on the Basque Country after its long and painful existence.

When he was just a child, Jon discovered his father's past, Iñaki Viar, linked to ETA. Son, grandson, and great-grandson of Basque nationalists, Iñaki was arrested in 1969 by the political-social brigade and tried alongside Teo Uriarte and Mario Onaindia in the Burgos Trial. Years later, he organized the escape from Segovia and, finally, in 1977, he regained his freedom. Iñaki, like many other prisoners, renounces nationalism and condemns terrorist violence. Jon, a film buff, tries to understand his father's past while living with attacks, kidnappings, and a lot of silence. By then, Iñaki is already considered a "traitor" by the nationalist world.

Donostia-San Sebastián, Basque Country, Spain, 2011. Maider, a filmmaker, moves to the very same flat where pedadogist Elbira Zipitria Irastorza (1906-1982) clandestinely established the first ikastola, a Basque school, under the harsh regime of dictator Francisco Franco. Despite of her pioneering work, developed throughout thirty years, her story is not well known, so Maider, intrigued, begins to research…

The film follows five people from different origins as they move anonymously around the streets of Berlin. Each of them with another life somewhere else, trying to ascertain where to go.

The abject crimes of the terrorist gang ETA have marked the lives of many Spaniards; men, women and children who were silenced, harassed, persecuted, finally murdered. Thirteen stories, thirteen tragedies, just thirteen among thousands.

Basque Country, Spain. No one seems to know them. Some glances avoid theirs. Their social circle becomes smaller and smaller. They live under escort, watched by those who protect them and by those who threaten them: it is the experience of living in the shadow of ETA, a savage terrorist gang of unscrupulous criminals… of merely existing under the yoke of those who tomorrow could be their executioners.

Through interviews with different people linked to the work and life of the Basque sculptor Jorge Oteiza (1908-2003), this documentary aims to unravel fundamental aspects of his work.

Donostia-San Sebastián, Basque Country, Spain, November 26th, 1985, at night. Mikel Zabalza, a young bus driver, is arrested along with other people by the Guardia Civil as part of an operation against the ruthless terrorist gang ETA. When the other detainees are released, they denounce that they have been brutally tortured in the Intxaurrondo facilities. Besides, Mikel is not among them: Mikel has disappeared.

Part of a series in which foreign filmmakers portray a region or town in France. Otar Iosselani looks at the Basque region and its inhabitants.