Chilean Filmmaker Maite Alberdi Honored at Canary Islands Film Festival

The Canary Islands International Reality Film Festival, Miradas Afroindígenas, which runs until November 29th in Puerto de la Cruz, has awarded its Personal Narrative prize to filmmaker Maite Alberdi from Santiago, Chile.

The festival's opening day on Saturday saw Alberdi receive her award. Georgina Higueras, a trailblazing Spanish war correspondent, was also honored with the Lucid Vision award. Additionally, a screening of Alberdi's 2020 film, "The Mole Agent," was held.

Alberdi is scheduled to participate in a discussion today, Sunday, at 7:00 PM with journalist and film critic Javier Tolentino. This conversation will take place between screenings of her films: "The Mole Agent" at 5:00 PM and "The Eternal Memory" at 9:00 PM.

On receiving awards and engaging with audiences:

"It's a very special recognition because Spain has embraced my films with a unique closeness, almost like a natural extension of my own territory. There's something in the way the perspectives, languages, and narrative forms are received that makes me feel at home. Dialoguing with the Spanish public is profoundly nourishing, and I am especially grateful for this award because it recognizes a perspective born from stories that belong to others, but which also resonate with me and ultimately belong a little to everyone. What I receive as a gift from my characters also becomes a gift for the audience. That's why this encounter brings me so much satisfaction. The conversation with viewers is always the best place for films to stay alive."

On her multifaceted filmmaking skills:

"I consider myself, above all, a director; that's what I do. In the other areas, I work with an extraordinary team that brings their own vision. My role is to make aesthetic decisions, accompany the characters, and define how the stories are told. I believe my greatest craft is observation: I film for many years, with great patience, allowing reality to reveal itself. That prolonged accompaniment is what has shaped my vision and my point of view as an author."

"I couldn't film someone with whom I don't feel a connection: empathy is what drives the director and, ultimately, the viewer."

On choosing everyday stories:

"I choose stories where I feel that reality and current issues seep through the walls, even if they are not explicitly named. My films address contingent and profoundly political issues, but from a different angle: not from a declared theme or direct exposition, as is often understood in more traditional documentaries. I am interested in issues that are present in social discussions, but for which there aren't always stories that allow us to visualize them from an intimate perspective. What I try to offer are those stories: narratives that embody broad themes through concrete, human experiences. For example, in 'The Eternal Memory,' I feel the film is fundamentally about caregiving and the role of women caregivers, a very present topic today, but approached from the intimate perspective of a couple caring for each other."

On reality's impact on filming:

"The big difference between documentary and fiction is that while in fiction directors start with a script, in documentaries we learn from reality and subordinate ourselves to it. This implies accepting the drift, understanding that we don't know what will happen, and being willing to adapt. Plans always change, but the vision doesn't: one knows what matters to them in that world and where their heart is. The details of the script and narrative, however, are a surprise. Making documentaries is about being present, patient, willing to embrace discovery, and letting the film transform with reality."

On documentary scripting:

"In a documentary script, each documentarian develops their own method. In my case, the closest thing to a script is a kind of shopping list. After a long period of observation – very anthropological, of accompanying the characters and living with them without a camera – I begin to identify situations, dynamics, and characters that interest me. Only when I deeply know that world do I bring in the camera. By then, I have that list: moments, behaviors, or scenes that I know exist in that environment and that I would like to find. And when they finally appear, I cross them off. It's a writing process that stems from prior knowledge and a connection to the place, rather than traditional planning."

"In fiction, everything is in the director's hands; in documentary, reality decides."

On the "hybrid" nature of her films:

"I would define my cinema as a cinema of the real. I don't consider it hybrid. All my films are documentaries because the stories are real and what appears on screen happened. Sometimes they may seem hybrid because they borrow heavily from the language of fiction, especially in observation and narrative construction. I spend so many years accompanying my characters that I end up knowing them deeply, and that familiarity makes the editing adopt a structure that can be reminiscent of fiction. The imagined appears mainly in the editing: in unexpected juxtapositions, associations, and rhythm. During filming, what prevails is reality and the patience it demands."

On empathy in filmmaking:

"Empathy is one of the foundations of documentary work. It's something one demands of oneself when choosing a character or a story. I couldn't film someone with whom I don't feel a deep connection: empathy is the engine that drives the director and, ultimately, the viewer. If I can't understand that reality from the inside, it's very difficult to translate it into an experience that reaches others. My main motivation when choosing a story has to do with that impulse: to understand it, feel it, and want to share it."

On the growing acceptance of documentary cinema:

"If we compare it to 10 years ago, today the industry and the public are much more open to documentaries. When I was studying film, it was very rare to find documentaries in theaters or even on television. That landscape has changed, partly thanks to platforms, which have created new audiences. It's also a credit to many directors who have understood that documentary is a genre like any other and deserves to speak to the public with narrative ambition. That more direct relationship has made distributors dare to program it more, in theaters and on platforms. There's still a way to go, but we are in a moment of greater openness and curiosity."

"My films address contingent and profoundly political issues, but from a different angle."

On her first fiction feature, 'El lugar de la otra':

"It was a very different experience. Although it's a fiction, it's based on a non-fiction book, 'Las homicidas,' by Alia Trabucco. Perhaps that's why it interested me so much: it's almost a period documentary. 'El lugar de la otra' is the documentary I would have made if those characters were alive. But directing fiction involves a completely different degree of control. In fiction, everything is in the director's hands: every decision is made on set. In documentary, reality decides. The characters set the pace, and one accompanies them. There are no closed shooting schedules or decisions in the traditional sense. Filming fiction was a return to what I was taught in film school: directing in the classic sense. It was special to reconnect with that control after so many years of surrendering to the documentary drift."