The late film critic Pauline Kael, who famously championed screenwriters to an extreme degree (her controversial essay on who actually wrote Citizen Kane being the prime example), would undoubtedly have been thrilled by the Retrospective of San Sebastián 2025: the complete filmography of Lillian Hellman, a frequent collaborator of director William Wyler (including projects she received no formal credit for) as well as the scripter of films like The Chase (for Arthur Penn) and Armored Attack (for Lewis Milestone). The homage also includes Dash and Lilly, Kathy Bates’ 1999 directorial effort about the Hellman’s love affair with crime novelist Dashiell Hammett.
Such a program is merely a fraction of what is a very female-centric edition of the Spanish festival, be it in front of the camera, behind it, or elsewhere. In fact, it all starts when one arrives in San Sebastián and is treated to the event’s key visual, the poster, which this year depicts Marisa Paredes. Already associated with the one-sheet in 2006, when she channeled Rita Hayworth in Orson Welles’ The Lady from Shanghai, she returns posthumously as San Sebastián acknowledges its long-running relationship with the great Madrid-born actress.
Often called upon to present awards, she also reported for duty in 1999 to collect the FIPRESCI Prize for All About My Mother in lieu of the absent Pedro Almodóvar, and acted in many films featured in the San Sebastián program over the years (her last appearance as part of a film delegation was in 2024, mere months before her death). Quite a few of them were produced by Esther García, the sometimes unsung heroine of the Almodóvar brothers’ company El Deseo and the recipient of one of this year’s Donostia Awards. Upon announcing the prize at the end of July, festival director José Luis Rebordinos referred to her as “a producer without whom it is impossible to understand the Spanish and Latin American cinema of the last 40 years.”
Her recent credits include Oliver Laxe’s Sirat, which was chosen as Spain’s submission for the International Feature Film category at the Oscars after already gaining kudos and awards in Cannes. The Croisette was also the launching ground for Lynne Ramsay’s Die My Love, which will have its Spanish premiere at San Sebastián as part of the tribute to the other Donostia Award honoree of this year’s edition: Jennifer Lawrence, who not only starred in the movie but also developed it as a producer, showing her artistic savvy behind the camera.
When perusing the program, films directed by women, both recognized auteurs and emerging talents, are an important component of the selection. Across all sections, the lineup includes the latest works by Claire Denis (The Fence), Lucrecia Martel (Landmarks), Milagros Mumenthaler (The Currents), Agnieszka Holland (Franz), Dominga Sotomayor (Limpia) and Dolores Fonzi (Belén), as well as promising debuts from Denmark (Emilie Thalund’s Weightless), the UK (Stroma Cairns’ The Son and the Sea) and Japan (Yukari Sakamoto’s White Flowers and Fruits), among others. The Official Selection is also hosting the first directorial effort of French superstar Juliette Binoche, another frequent visitor of the festival.
Furthermore, the program is bookended by women’s stories when it comes to the opening and closing films of the event: the inaugural screening was Daniel Hendler’s 27 Nights, based on the true story of an elderly woman (riotously played by the superb Marilú Marini) who was sent to a psychiatric hospital against her will; the final slot, meanwhile, belongs to Kasia Adamik’s Winter of the Crow, a Cold War thriller starring one of the greats of British acting, Leslie Manville.
