Undergrowth

Trailer

Synopsis

HYPERREALISM AND FANTASY

Musa Camara (Mauritania, 28 years old) doesn’t have a job. He spends his days alone, wondering around the beautiful forests and chaotic residential areas that surround Cassà de la Selva, the village he lives in.

He tries to find pinecones and brushwood to gather which he later sells to small businesses in the area. With the tiny profit from these transactions, this young African man lives meagerly in a house shared with other migrants. Due to the risky nature of this work, Musa occasionally tries to find work in the residential areas.

Often though, he doesn’t know what to do and simply wanders around. He lives on the fringes of 21st century European society, but his job is the oldest in existence: the gathering of nature’s resources. With a slow tempo and few words, the camera follows Musa in his adventures around the daily life of a country that still suffers the ravaging consequences of a burst housing bubble. Musa fights to survive in a primitive, beautiful way.

UNDERGROWTH is a witness to the collision between a young African man and the Spanish society he unsuccessfully tries to integrate. Somehow, Musa seems to keep his spirits high: the rivers of his sadness ow underground.

Statement

I have always felt attracted to what’s different, to what breaks the uniformity and generates questions. And the place and time when I grew up, Vidreres, a small village close to Girona, in Catalonia, Spain in the late 80’s, early 90’s wasn’t diverse. It was around this time when people who looked nothing like me started arriving to that monochrome environment. They had darker skin and were devoted to professions I found strange. They weren’t well received by most people. They were the first Africans arriving in Catalonia and I liked them. Seeing these people with much darker skin than mine interested my childish and playful self.

Years later, with my energy devoted to the creation of cinema (or its attempt), I weighed the possibility of making a film about African immigration in rural Catalonia. I am talking about eight years ago, soon after I finished studying. While researching and exploring the possibility, I met many Africans and I realized with amazement that their reality was so different from my own, despite living just 200 meters from my grandmother’s house. It was as though I could travel to Mali by walking up the road. Getting to know the nine people that lived in a small apartment and ate with their hands, they told me they were returning from collecting pinecones in the forest. It fascinated me. But films aren’t made solely by an interest in another reality. After a few months, I abandoned the idea. I didn’t know how to proceed.

My life evolved and, having more knowledge about filmmaking, I started researching the topic again, simultaneously looking inside myself to find out what type of film I wanted to make. And slowly, while meeting a lot of people from the community, writing a sort of fiction script and making many screen tests of possible cast members, I started to find the tone of the film I wanted to make. But it wasn’t until I found Musa Camara that I knew that I had to start shooting as soon as possible. His look, his intelligence and his presence in front of the camera convinced me. He had to be the protagonist of the project. It was time to make the film.

Cast & Crew

CAST


Musa Camara

Sambia Diallo

Deborah Marín

Talula Watson

Rosa Torres

Francisco Sánchez

Josep Adroguer

Diarra Cissoko

Amadou Dembele

Bandiougou Diawara

Ahmed Yabara

Llorenç Soler

Arpad Pou

Assumpta Biel

Encarna Martínez

Aimar López

Concesa Marcos

Miquel Anicet

Bangaly Coulidaly

Felisia Casadevall

 

David Gutiérrez Camps (Vidreres, 1982) is a filmmaker based in Barcelona. He has directed two feature films: in 2013 he premiered The Juan Bushwick Diaries and this 2018  Undergrowth has been released. Both received a quite unanimous critical acclaim and have been shown in festivals like Seville, D’A Film festival Barcelona or New Horizons. He also directs commercials, music videos and documentaries, and is one of the filmmakers who contributes to the pedagogical program “cinema en curs”, teaching film to youngsters.  He grew up in Vidreres (Girona, Spain) and studied Audiovisual Communication in Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona) and FAMU (Prague, Czech Republic). He also attended the New School in New York City in 2009.

 



Directed by David Gutiérrez Camps

Director of Photography: Aïda Torrent

Executive Production: John Bartleby, Albert Baquero

Production manager: John Bartleby

Script and editing: David Gutiérrez Camps

Music: Pau Guillamet

Poster design: Alejo Levis

Sound Design: Gabriel Hurtado, Idoia Iñárritu


Color correction: Albert Sellés

Image postproduction: Joaquín Jordán

Sound recording: Toni Grabulosa

Sound editing: Toni Grabulosa

Foley artists: Gabriel Hurtado, Idoia Iñárritu

Sound mixing: Pablo Gregorio

Production asistants: Enriqueta Camps, Pedro Cherino, Arieh Truzman

Camera assistant: Arpad Pou


Screenings

COMMERCIAL RELEASE IN SPAIN IN OCTOBER 5th!

 

Screenings in  MADRID

Cine Estudio, Círculo de Bellas Artes:

5/10/18,  22:00

6/10/18, 19:00

 

Screenings in BARCELONA

Zumzeig:

4/10/18, 19:00

7/10/18, 21:30

 

 

Cines Girona:

10/10/18, 20:00

17/10/18, 20:00

24/10/18, 20:00

31/10/18, 20:00

13/11/18, 22:00

 

Screenings in GIRONA

Temporada Alta, Cines Truffaut

23/10/18,  20:30

 

Cassà de la Selva, Saló recreatiu

28/10/18, 18:00

 

OTHER CITIES

Cinespaña. Festival de Cinema Espagnol de Toulouse

8/10/18, 19:40

10/10/18, 14:00

12/10/18, 16:00

 

Muestra de cine Iberoamericano de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria

22/19/18, 20:30

 

 

 

SCREENINGS IN THE PAST:

 

7/11/2017. Festival de Cine Europeo de Sevilla.

Nervión Plaza, Sevilla, 20:30.

 

8/11/2017. Festival de Cine Europeo de Sevilla.

Nervión Plaza, Sevilla, 22:00.

 

9/11/2017. Festival de Cine Europeo de Sevilla.

Nervión Plaza, Sevilla, 17:00.

 

16/4/2018. “En la frontera”.

Sala Berlanga, Madrid. 19:00

 

18/4/2018. “En la frontera”.

Sala Berlanga, Madrid. 21:00

 

20/4/2018. “En la frontera”.

Sala Berlanga, Madrid. 21:00

 

29/4/2018. Festival de Cine Africano.

Tarifa, 21:15.

 

2/5/2018. D’A Film Festival Barcelona.

Teatro del CCCB, Barcelona. 18:00.

 

4/5/2018. Festival de Cine Africano.

Tarifa, 17:30.

 

18/5/2018

Cinefòrum Vidreres, 21:30.

 

18/5/2018

Nit dels museus, Santa Margarida i els Monjos: 20:30.

 

27/7/2018

New Horizons International Film Festival

Knh 6, Wroclaw (Poland). 19:00.

 

28/7/2018

New Horizons International Film Festival

Dcf, Wroclaw (Poland). 19:00.

 

28/9/18

Madrid, Cine estudio CBA,  17:00

 

29/9/18

Madrid, Cine estudio CBA, 21:30

 

30/9/18

Madrid, Cine estudio CBA, 20:00

Press

DOWNLOAD PRESS INFO.

 

OTHER LINKS:

La Vanguardia review.

Otros Cines Europa review.

El Periódico review.

Fotogramas review.

Filmin review.

Encadenados review.

Cine Maldito review.

242 películas después review.

La Vanguardia, review.

Fotogramas review.

La Razón review.

 

QUOTES:

“Una obra pura y hermosa”, La Vanguardia

“La exposición de las condiciones laborales de los inmigrantes es reveladora”, El Mundo.

“Un bello poema visual”, Què fem?

“El filme tiene un raro efecto hipnótico que te atrae por su simplicidad” Javier Martín Corral, Redrum.

“Respira vida y verdad en cada fotograma” La Vanguardia

“Es el grito de denuncia de Gutiérrez Camps para hablar de una situación en la Europa actual”, La Razón.

“Un buen ejemplo de obra que cuestiona los límites estéticos o argumentales del documental, sirviéndose de ellos para crear un film muy interesante”, Cine Maldito.

 

Contact

sotaboscfilm@camillezonca.com
info@johnbartleby.com
T. 00 34 93 320 96 63
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