Short Films

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International Competition

THE WATER
EL AGUA

• Director: Elena López Riera
• SWITZERLAND, SPAIN, FRANCE / 2022 / DCP / Colour / 105’ / Spanish; Turkish, English s.t.

• Screenplay: Elena López Riera, Philippe Azoury
• Director of Photography: Giuseppe Truppi
• Editing: Raphaël Lefèvre
• Music: Mandine Knoepfel
• Cast: Luna Pamies, Bárbara Lennie, Nieve de Medina, Alberto Olmo, Irene Pellicer, Nayara García, Lidia María Cánovas, Pascual Valero
• Producer: Eugenia Mumenthaler, David Epiney
• Production Co.: Alina Film, Les Films du Worso, Suica Films
• World Sales: Elle Driver

Summertime in a small village in southeastern Spain... A storm threatens to cause the river crossing the village to overflow again. Throughout the village, an old popular belief is repeated like a litany, claiming that some women are predestined to disappear with each new flood, because they were born with ‘the water inside.’ Local teenagers try to survive the weariness of a summer in the village, smoking cigarettes, dancing and drinking. In this electric atmosphere preceding the storm, Ana, who dreams of fleeing this village that stinks of death, and José will live a story of summer love. Taking place in the town where the director Elena López Riera grew up, El Agua inspires from an existing legend: ‘There is a saint for rain and another to avoid too much rain. This ancestral fear of water, both desired and feared, has been passed on to women. Because at home, fears and taboos about sexuality are transmitted by the mother.’ Premiering within the Directors’ Fortnight section at Cannes 2022, El Agua employs mainly non-professional actors.

This film was a Meetings on the Bridge participant.