HE Preview It marks the opening of this film’s exhibition at Sax, with a screening at Sala Berlanga in Madrid on 27 October and a theatrical release scheduled for 3 November. A small number of copies include regions such as the province, the Valencian Community, Madrid, Galicia, and Catalonia.
Miguel Herrero channels his two passions — cinema and illusionism, tightly linked — into this documentary, a project pursued for more than a year through extensive conversations with experts such as the French prehistorian and author Jean Clots, and the renowned illusionist Juan Tamariz.
The documentary’s wealth of filmed material has given rise to three versions: a standard 115-minute cut, a longer 144-minute edition, and an extended cinema version. Alongside the film, a magic show and live music accompany the experience. Tsvetelina Lyubenova Avramova leads the soundtrack, shaping it into something that feels like more than a movie — a full show.
The director notes that the project allows the integration of other disciplines built around scenes from the film, letting audiences glimpse what viewers might have witnessed centuries ago. He explains that no other feature film has undertaken such an approach, blending audiovisual mystery with fascination from another era. In certain sequences, the work uses samples and displays of pre-cinema artifacts, some originals dating from the 18th to early 20th centuries. These artifacts belong to the blacksmith’s personal collection.
Chiaroscuro has already earned about a dozen selections at national and international festivals and will be screened in movie libraries as well.
Manager
Miguel Herrero, born in Sax in 1985, is a filmmaker, illusionist, writer, and teacher. He is a psychology PhD student and holds master’s degrees in psychology research and psychopedagogy, plus a teaching diploma with a music specialization. He is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and has directed, written, or produced projects such as Arcadeology related to Mario-Paul Martinez, Special Operations with various collaborators, and around twenty short films. He has amassed over 400 official chapters and more than a hundred awards. He also directed the Sax International Film Festival, which earned a Goya Award nomination across seventeen editions.
He founded the Kinesthesia production company and publishing house. Herrero has authored more than fifteen books covering topics from hyperfiction and cinema divas to metacine, emotion, empathy in cinema, cinema-related quotations, Japanese cinema, and devices that provoke hallucinatory experiences. His works also explore magic, illusionism, and cinema, necromancy, and media archaeology, plus a complete collection of Robertson’s works and Misterium, Knocketc.
He organizes illusionist and phantasmagoria shows and curates pre-cinema objects from the 18th and 19th centuries from his collection. Widely regarded as a leading expert on the origins of cinema and audiovisual works, he has received recognition from Mervyn Heard of the British Magical Lantern Society on two occasions and currently collaborates with Cuarto Milenio.