Sara, a young woman from a working class neighborhood, starts university and constructs her identity, split between her friends from her community and the new world she is exposed to as she comes of age.
Title: A nuestros amigos
Internacional title: To our friends
Genre: Hibrit (Non-fiction/fiction) | Coming-of-age
Estimated length: 90 minutes
Shooting format: 2K
Screening format: DCP Color 2K
Country of production: Spain | Portugal
Original language: Spanish
Subtitles: English
Produced by: New Folder Studio, El Viaje Films, Karõ Filmes
Production year: 2024
Release year: Visions du Réel (2024)
Color: Color
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
Sound: Dolby 5.1
Director: Adrián Orr
Script: Adrián Orr, Celso Giménez, Samuel M. Delgado
Cinematography: Adrián Orr
Editor: Ana Pfaff
Sound design: Miguel Martins
Interpreters: Sara Toledo, Pedro Izquierdo, Paula Mirá.
Executive Producers: Hugo Herrera, Marina Alberti, João Salaviza
Visions du Réel Festival | Internacional Premiere
FICUNAM | Internacional Competition
SEMINCI | Sección Oficial Punto de Encuentro
DOCLISBOA | Oficial Selection New Visions
Muestra Internacional de Cine de São Paulo
Festival Cinespaña – Toulouse | Compétition documentaire
Abycine | Enfoques Section
Porto/Post/Doc | Mostra Espanha
Tallgrass Film Festival (EEUU)
RIDM – Montreal International Documentary Festival (Canadá) | International Feature Competition
I felt the need to make a film that would recapture and imbue itself with the chaotic strength that we all had in our teenage years. To create a story that would channel that vital energy that comes from believing that everything is possible, even when you don’t have the tools to be able
to imagine that “everything” very well.
But also, to make a film that shows the transcendence of the passage of time, and how that energy is transformed over the years.
In the beginning we filmed moments with Sara, almost like notes or rehearsals for what would later become scenes in the film. In that process of discovering and getting to know Sara, I realized that she was following a very similar path to the one I followed. The encounter with Sara was becoming more and more an encounter with myself and my own trajectory. With her new friends, Sara was discovering a new social reality that, without realizing it, was changing her profoundly, just as it happened to me.
“A nuestros amigos” is an invitation to immerse ourselves into the life of Sara Toledo over the course of four years. She has given us the opportunity to build a life parallel to her reality, to be filmed as if it were her own. A new life, created in a raw and natural way to address, concretely, some of the main issues that define the identity of young people in Madrid today; focusing on a generation that, like us, has grown up in the outskirts of the city.
Adrián Orr
