‘Samsara’ Director Lois Patiño on ‘Ariel’ Follow Up

Lois Patiño, one of the leading lights of the New Galician Cinema in Spain, is putting the final touches to “Ariel,” the highly anticipated follow up to his critically-acclaimed feature ”Samsara” which has secured distribution in more than a dozen territories and won a Special Jury Prize at the Berlinale Encounters 2023.

A contemporary and playful reinterpretation of Shakespeare’s “The Tempest” from the perspective of the character Ariel, the feature, produced by Spain’s Filmika Galaika with Portugal’s Bando à Parte, will be sneak-peeked for the first time ever at the inaugural ECAM Forum co-production market, set to run June 10-14 in Madrid.

Producer Beli Martínez said more than 80% of the financing is locked via broadcasting partners RTP in Portugal, TVG in Galicia, Spain, public funders AGADIC in Galicia and Spanish federal agency ICAA and Turismo de Portugal. 

At ECAM Forum, she will be looking for post-production financing, distribution and sales.

“Ariel” is Patiño’s first full dive into fiction, after several contemplative and transcendent works, where he mixed documentary and sensorial exploration. Here, using a meta narrative, the filmmaker and artist blurs the lines between reality and fiction, life and representation. In this ambiguous space, actors – professionals and non-pros – play themselves and/or Shakespeare characters (as many as 60!), and nature – the striking Azores islands – turns…