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“It is not a documentary about Basque dances, it is a fiction movie without dialogue − the story will be told through dance,” Telmo Esnal, filmmaker from Zarautz, Gipuzkoa told Euskalkultura.com. Sculptor Koldobika Jauregi and dance expert Juan Antonio Urbeltz are also working with him on the project titled,  ‘Dantza,’  and they hope that it will be in theaters by 2016.

Donostia-San Sebastian. Esnal and Jauregi met while shooting a video for Bilbao’s Guggenheim Museum some years ago and, ever since, they’ve been thinking of making a movie with Basque dance as the central them. After Esnal finished his last feature length, Happy New Year, Grandma!, both artists had time to get involved in the long-discussed project that tells the story of a fictional village through dance. “We went to see Juan Antonio (Urbeltz) because he is the one who knows most about Basque dances. Then, using his hypotheses as a starting point, we wrote the script.” Esnal is directing the movie, Jauregi is in charge of the designs of the costumes and the attrezzo, and Urbeltz is their advisor.

They have already made the teaser of the film but they plan to shoot it “little by little” in 2015. “Shooting with dancers is not the same as shooting with actors,” said Esnal. “We’ll need more time, there are some sequences where there will be over 200 dancers dancing together.” They plan to edit the film as they go and, if they find financing, to launch it in 2016. “We hope to have it ready by 2016. We are working on getting funding in Spain, and people from Ateka, a producing company from Iparralde, will try to get funding in France. This is not just a film, it is a cooperative project.” In fact, dancers in the film are also from both sides of the Pyrenees.

“If we want to strengthen our cinema we will have to do it this way, working in joint projects with Iparralde. And dance is probably the best topic to do so” thinks Esnal. “I’m very excited about this movie because it puts my two passions together: filmmaking and dance. I cannot wait to have funding and shoot more sequences.”