Bilbao, May 7 (EFE) .- “Making movies is a game, an adventure, and those of us who do it feel alive with it”, are the words that suspense film director Jaume Balagueró has dedicated to a profession that he has been practicing for more than 25 years.
The Catalan filmmaker has been received at the Bilbao City Council before this afternoon he receives the award of honor from the Bilbao Fantastic Film Festival (FANT), which is celebrating its 27th edition.
Balagueró has admitted that when he is awarded prizes for his career he feels “a bit overwhelmed, but always happy” and has been “especially excited” to be in Bilbao and at the Festival, because FANT has been on his path since he arrived. “like an illusioned child” with the short film Alicia (1994), his first film work, in the 1997 edition.
Regarding whether he has the leap to Hollywood in mind, Balagueró has declared that “it is not an objective in itself”, since he can make films, even internationally, “close to home and his children”, and go to another site for a long period “would be difficult.”
“I remember as a child as someone who dreamed of making movies”, recalled the Lleida director, “I used to record shorts at home and I was a director, actor, cameraman and producer with enormous enthusiasm”.
His desire to create films came true in 1999, when he directed his first feature film, “Los sin nombre,” which catapulted him onto the international market after winning the Méliès de Oro for best European fantasy film.
During the reception he expressed his “passion for storytelling and challenges” and pointed out that “each new film or project is an adventure”.
It is that eagerness that led him, together with director Paco Plaza, to shoot the first installment of the “REC” saga in 2007, which would be completed with three other films in the next seven years and which received the Goya for best editing of the year. of its premiere.
“REC was an almost experimental project, with which we wanted to take risks and it was not until its selection for the Venice Film Festival that we realized that perhaps what we had devised was good,” Balagueró recalled.
His latest work, “Way Down”, will be released in November 2021 and has the participation of actors such as Freddie Highmore, protagonist of the series “The Good Doctor”, or José Coronado.
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