“Life is not like in the movies, it is more difficult.” In that ode to cinema that is ‘Cinema Paradiso’, the projectionist Alfredo summarizes his work for Totò in one sentence. This describes very well the relation of the familia Acha with the Novedades cinema by Miranda de Ebro, the only theater that worked in the town of Burgos. This is how it was about 25 years ago, when the family took it, and it has remained that way until this month of January, when Iñigo Acha, the manager, passed away.. Returning to ‘Cinema Paradiso’, Alfredo tells Totò: «Here you are like a slave. You always work like a donkey, even at holidays, Easter, Christmas. You are only free on Good Friday and I assure you that if Jesus Christ had not been crucified, work would also be done on Good Friday ». But that projectionist also felt a little responsible for the laughter and emotions that movies elicited in the people of his town. And that was the best reward.
Edurne, Iñigo’s sister, remembers that her father, Emilio Acha, taught them to work hard and, Regarding the management of Novedades cinema, he warned them that “if we were not willing to be for the people, to give the best for the viewer, it made no sense for us to be there”. And so they did, in the final years of this room, the brothers Iñigo and Marisa. On January 27, Iñigo passed away, a hard blow for the Acha family and for the family of moviegoers who created and maintained in Miranda. «For some days, after his death, we could not move the gate of the cinema because of the amount of flowers and bouquets that the people of Mirandes deposited in it. June 25 was his birthday and it happened again. They have written us some beautiful things. We have felt the affection of the Mirandeses », Edurne acknowledges excitedly.
A few days after the death of Iñigo Acha, the gate of the Novedades cinema could not be moved. It had become an altar with flowers in tribute
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The cinema, one more member of the family
At the age of 14, Emilio Acha, father of Edurne, Nekane, Iñigo, Mari Jose and Marisa, started working for a film distributor of buttons. Money was needed in his house. Like many Spaniards, Emilio’s father was retaliated for ideological and political reasons and was imprisoned in France, so Emilio had to go to work very early while his mother did the same in Altos Hornos de Vizcaya.
Emilio continued working for this distributor and when he began his military service he offered to take the cinema of the barracks, which was unused. With a Super 8 projector and with the treatment he had with movie houses, he started with it, another way to help financially at home. Emilio’s life was quickly linked to the cinema and so it continued until He ended up being the manager of Warner Bros for the north of Spain, in Bilbao, and manager of Vitoriana de Espectáculos SA de Vitoria (VESA).
The father, Emilio Acha, spent his life watching movies and trying to find what the public could like the most
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Emilio spent his whole life watching movies and trying to find what the public could like the most. Edurne remembers that, when her father worked in Bilbao, he took the whole family to the previews to see their reaction. «He and my mother went to the San Sebastián Film Festival every year and lived it very intensely. It was a very important day, like the Oscar gala. That night we stayed watching the gala and the next day they let us skip school“, remember.
The cinema has been one more member of this family. No wonder Edurne’s statement, «we are very cinephiles. We see almost everything on the billboard and my children also do it now. Remember that when her father was manager of Warner Bros, he had free tickets and she could spend evenings watching up to three sessions in a row. This is how all the brothers have been, very movie geeks.
The Hacha family and cinema News
There came a time when Emilio did not feel comfortable with the decisions of the company he worked for. «He was a man convinced that in the cinema you had to give the best for the viewer. So He left the company and started hiring films for other people in Vitoria, where there were many cinemas, and to do the programming of theaters ».
Emilio Acha was a man convinced that in the cinema you had to give the best for the viewer
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When he stopped programming in Vitoria, Emilio proposed to his wife that she find a business that could be managed by the whole family. His wife, “a very bravado from La Rioja who was worth everything” told him yes, that wherever he went he would go with him and they would work. Emilio had some friends in Miranda and the possibility of renovating that cinema was opened, the Novedades cinema, which had been closed for a long time.
And that’s where the Acha family got into 25 years ago. Emilio had to ask for a lot of money to undertake the reform and they all worked cleaning and removing debris for a summer. They premiered in September with ‘The Flintstones’.
25 years ago there was no cinema in Miranda and the Acha family once again brought life, culture, art, emotions and sensations to the cinema Novedades. “It was hard to fill the room”remembers Edurne. At the age of 10 his mother died and her death greatly affected the whole family, but, above all, his father, who was no longer the same.
«Iñigo was a forestry engineer and had nothing to do with this. If things hadn’t happened like that, it wouldn’t have ended up in the movies.
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At that moment, Iñigo and Marisa began to take charge of the cinema, learning from their father. «Iñigo was a forestry engineer and had nothing to do with this. If things hadn’t happened like that, I wouldn’t have ended up in the movies, ”his sister reflects. But Life put him in that position and he faced the challenge: to carry out what his father had loved so much, the project of the whole family, the cinema. News. “He was obsessed and the cinema was the center of his life,” recalls his sister Edurne. So much so that he went to live near the cinema, “so he could quickly go to look at the temperature, check that everything was correct, triangulate the sound. He wanted to take the Novedades cinema to the maximum, ”he points out.
An unforgettable legacy Bringing premieres to Miranda, a cinema in a rural setting, is complicated but necessary. Entering that dark room that is a cinema is an intimate and personal journey. Beyond leisure, it is an exercise in reflection and thought that everyone should be able to experience. Miranda is a small square, but for Iñigo it was the ‘biggest’. “The world of distributors is complicated, my father knew how to weather them, but Iñigo had it worse and it affected him a lot when they did not give him, after many films, the premieres,” recalls his sister. Iñigo Acha is a name that Miranda will not forget. He and his sister Marisa have been in charge of bringing cinema to this Burgos town every day of the week, except Thursdays, “and if Thursday was a holiday, there was also a cinema.” as Alfredo explained to Totò. The family hopes that those in charge of reopening the cinema will bring the best to the people of Miranda. “The affection that people have shown us is mutual,” Edurne acknowledges. For this reason, they hope that the way of understanding the cinema of the Acha family does not fall into oblivion, it remains. «Iñigo offered many sessions with 20 people, but they just couldn’t go another day. This cinema was committed to making it possible for the maximum number of people to enjoy this art ”, says Edurne. And that entailed constant work, improvements, investment. “My brother was constantly making improvements. The Novedades cinema, in a city like Miranda, had an enviable technology. It could have survived with a worse projection, “he says, but that was not fulfilling what Emilio Acha wanted, giving the best for the viewer. The Acha family just hopes that “Miranda gets what she deserves” – Now that the Acha family is physically disassociating themselves from Novedades cinema. The property is not theirs and they have maintained it during the covid-19 pandemic but it was unfeasible to continue with it. They just hope that “Miranda gets what she deserves.” Their separation is only physical; the footprint, the signature, the philosophy and the way of understanding the cinema of the Acha family will always be part of the Novedades cinema, because they made it a reality. They made possible the emergence of those sensations impossible to achieve otherwise, those that emerge when the lights are turned off and the projector is turned on. In Cinema Paradiso the cinema ends up being just a memory. I neglect it, oblivion ends up with him before the demolition company does, the Novedades cinema deserves a better future because the Acha family planted the seed for it. – .
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