5Q's w/Ernesto Redondo Vergara “Feetless Shoes” Director, Writer

QUESTION#1: Can you describe your film in one sentence?

It's a drama about a disfunctional familly that works on a circus, where smiling is mandatory.

QUESTION#2: What would you like the BSFF audience to know about your film that they wouldn't consider from it's title?

The idea came one day when I was observing my father on a hot summer day. We have always been very distant from each other and, stearing at him, I realized that I have never seen his feet. I thought it was an analogy of our relationship. The shoes are a barrier that separates us, and at the same time, he doesn't want to remove them or he would lose his throne. It's of course all exaggerated, but in the end, a resume of how me, my brothers and sisters had to deal with the character.

QUESTION#3: Can you tell us about yourself and your filmmaking career?

I have been wondering between animation and live action films. My ideal film would be an entertainment event with a dose of poetry but at the same time, having a social message embedded with a full spoon of sugar. Dystopias and science fiction stories that breathe realism. That has some perks, in my opinion, since we can get very lost in the rooms of the imagination and forget the message. This is what I'm trying to work and fix for my next film.

QUESTION#4: What have you learned in the process of making your film?

For this film, we had a shooting full of technical accidents that slowed us down. In some scenes there were more than 80 people on stage so it was all a bit too much to control for a short film with minimum budget and small team. I took on myself some roles that distracted me from my directing role. I guess the biggest lesson is to be a bit more humble with the scope of the project so everybody has more room for experimentation and less for unwanted errors. Of course in the end we were happy with the achievement and it was an incredible training, so it's all part of the job.

QUESTION#5: What's does the future hold for this film and you?

After Borrego Springs, our next stop will be a tiny but special festival. The International Moving Festival that happens every year in a different place of the globe. It is also in the holly list of the 100 best reviewed festivals in Filmfreeway, so we are very excited about that. Before, we were in Cerdanya (Spain) and Black nights film festival in Tallinn (PÖFF). Our aim is to show the film in every place that considers our story worth it. Small and big festivals are equally important for us. In the end they all have an audience willing to sit in a dark room and get connected with new and challenging characters.

Our first selection with this film came from a very big international festival, normally it would have been a dream for every storyteller to connect with such a competition. However, it had a little drawback. The festival was in Moscow, and because of the current war in Ukraine, we felt that we couldn't participate in an event directly sponsored by a state that is murdering openly thousands of people. We took the decision to withdraw.

@ErnestoRedondoVergara