He is currently competing in his first feature film, the Berlinale. “20,000 species of bees”. The story of a girl trapped inside what is traditionally considered a child’s body For this reason, it is a film that is aware of the fact that it is a response to the social deprivation situation, which is exposed to incomprehensibility – by her mother, father, siblings, aunt, grandmother, almost everyone – and explains the carelessness on this issue. combining its symbolic richness with dialogues and situations established in pedagogy and didacticism. Considering that the Golden Bear, which was awarded to Carla Simón last year thanks to ‘Alcarràs’, is the first of the awards to be given to Spanish cinema in nearly forty years and the first award to go to a Spanish female director in the entire history of the festival, looking at the list of winners to be announced in three days, the tyranny of the statistics itself It seems clear that it’s working against him. As they say, yes, stranger things have been seen.
His movie tells how Aitor became Lucía. Have you ever had doubts about whether to choose a boy or a girl to play the character?
I knew from the start it had to be a girl. Because for me the character does not make any transitions. He knows who he is and who he is not; What makes a transition is, in any case, his linguistic capacity to express what happened to him. When you’re 8 you don’t know what’s going on out there, you don’t have tools, and it’s impossible to identify something you didn’t know existed. While the movie also talks about another transition, the one his family had to go through in order to stop seeing him and treat him like a child.
The film presents the situations, prejudices, and misunderstandings created by a case like Lucía’s in a subtle, preliminary, and revealing way. which ending?
During my research process, I realized that with families in such a situation, the questions these boys and girls ask their parents are devastating; They may seem naive, but they point directly to the very foundation of the social order in which we construct ourselves, accepting it as something natural rather than artificially constructed as it really is, and therefore not questioning it. The boundaries that these children draw with their questions and which we cannot see are revealed. The movie tries to do the same with these questions. And on the contrary, it does not aspire to give more than one answer.
Which?
Everyone, even at the age of 8, has the right to live and be evaluated according to their own identity and to question the categorization that is imposed on them from birth, and although this is obvious, it still needs to be explained. And that’s what this movie is trying to reflect on a more tolerant and understanding future and a greater diversity of the human factor.
The world depicted with “20,000 species of bees” is a small bee community. women three different generations; men are either absent or in the background. To what extent did you position the film as a reflection on femininity?
I was also interested in suggesting a reflection on what it means to be a woman, as Lucía claims to be who she is and uses many of the predetermined codes of femininity when she expresses herself as a woman. As the movie makes clear, to be a woman is to be very different things. Now all female characters have one thing in common: they have been victims of the humility and shame that female subjectivity inevitably suffers in a patriarchal system. They found that their individual experiences and desires were less likely and right to express and pursue them.
The ‘20,000 species of bees’ come to light just days after the ‘Trans Law’ was passed in Spain. What do you think about the social transformation process of which the norm is a reflection?
I am particularly interested in the fact that the preparatory process has forced many groups to come together, discuss and discuss terminology. And by itself, this process of reflection and discussion about a group whose fundamental rights are not guaranteed in this democratic society shows that we are on our way. Thanks to new generations, we will continue to progress and develop.
What do you think about a section of feminism opposing the law?
There is no single time for women, and no single type of feminism, and this must be acknowledged. However, feminisms imply an assertion of otherness, as opposed to normativity traditionally built around the human being. And I think feminism cannot ignore other othernesses that do not guarantee the same rights that women have long claimed. Recognition of other political subjects such as trans women and trans men within feminism will not interfere with the struggle for women’s rights.
While talking about the existence of ‘20,000 species of bees’ in the Berlinale competition, it is impossible not to remember that Carla Simón’s work ‘Alcarràs’ won the Golden Bear just one year ago at this festival. How do you feel about this?
The most important thing for me in this regard, beyond competitions and awards, is the increasing focus on Spanish cinema made by women. Of course, it’s just a label, but I think it’s positive because recognizing a space for us also makes it clear that we haven’t had it for long. And now we have that hole and that’s fine. And of course there is much more to be done, but schools and institutions are taking appropriate action.