Punto de Vista drives Navarre as an international centre of documentary film

02/17/2025

The nineteenth edition of Punto de Vista was presented today. The international documentary film festival of Navarre, backed by the government of Navarre and organised by the public company NICDO, goes from strength to strength as a landmark thanks to its high national and international profile. The event, due to celebrate two decades of history next year, returns to Pamplona from 24th February to 1st March to drive the region as a centre of culture, as stated this morning by Rebeca Esnaola, the Navarrese government's minister for culture and sport, Manuel Asín, artistic director of Punto de Vista and Teresa Morales de Álava, executive director of the festival. Rebeca Esnaola emphasised that, «The festival is cementing its position as an international landmark, because of the films shown here, the people who come, public interest and its determination to improve and innovate. A distinctive space to assist creativity, exchange and knowledge, presenting us with new approaches and languages; unique ways of putting the realities around us into pictures».

For his part, Manuel Asín stressed that «The festival is this year once again a key date to see some of the most critical, innovative offerings on the documentary film scene», in what will be his last year as artistic director. Finally, Teresa Morales de Álava stated that, «Thanks to years of work by all the teams involved, Punto de Vista has cemented its position both nationally, by forging ever stronger networks of collaboration, and internationally, as shown by the invitation from Doc Alliance to join its network. We hope this will reinforce the value of the festival for its film-makers and also for Navarre».

The festival has placed tickets for all its sessions on sale on its website and at the Baluarte box office. There will also be an additional box office in the lobby at the venue throughout the week. Standard tickets will cost 3 euros per session, except for some that are free. The event, firmly rooted in the professional and academic sphere of the audiovisual sector, is open to anyone interested in culture and in discovering the latest trends in documentary film.

 

Key figures at Punto de Vista 2025

- During the festival there will be more than 70 sessions, including screenings and other related activities.

- The programme, organised into 6 broad sections - the Official Section, In Focus, Lan, Contacts, X Films and the Mediation programme - will feature a total of 60 films.

- The Official Selection is made up of 17 films from 13 different countries: Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, Ireland, the Lebanon, Palestine, South Korea, Spain and Tunisia. All of them are competing for the 5 festival awards - the Punto de Vista Grand Prize for best film, the Jean Vigo prize for best director, the prize for best short film, the special audience prize for best film and the youth prize for best film. Also, the International Jury may award up to two special commendations.

- Some 80 guests will be visiting Pamplona to present their work or reflect on different aspects of documentary film, with a range of international profiles: film-makers, heads of programming, curators and so on.

- Nearly 400 professionals, students and representatives of the press have already got passes for Punto de Vista. The deadline for online passes has already expired, but they can be requested at the box office in the Baluarte lobby during the festival.

- There have been plenty of applications to take part in the schemes aimed at young people, the Youth Jury and Young Programmers. 110 people have applied, from whom 20 young people have been chosen for the Youth Jury and 12 for Young Programmers.

- Baluarte, Cines Golem, Museo Oteiza, Civivox Condestable, Civivox Mendillorri, La Ciudadela, Filmoteca de Navarra and the bar Txintxarri will be the 8 venues where Punto de Vista is to take place.

 

Punto de Vista Routes: a different way to discover the festival

Following last year's positive experience, this year Punto de Vista will be offering five transversal routes, made up of films in different sections of the festival. This year audiences can explore the programme through (1) Gender(s): the divided, unequal species - feminism(s), gender(s), bodies; (2) Sick Planet: environmental emergency, climate change, the anthropocene, planetary, ecological and human régimes; (3) Come Along to Punto de Vista: ideas for those new to the festival; (4) First Person: portrait, self-portrait, diary, memory, essay, individualism; and (5) Artificial Intelligence: a new technological paradigm, generative artificial intelligence.

 

Miñuca Villaverde and Frans van de Staak are to preside over special opening and closing sessions.

The opening and closing sessions will be devoted to two historic works that were underrated at the time but which the festival wishes to retrieve from a new point of view. Monday 24th February will see the showing of Tent City (1980), the only documentary by pioneering Cuban film-maker, Miñuca Villaverde, followed by a discussion with the director, her husband and collaborator the writer and director Fernando Villaverde, and the programmer José Luis Aparicio. The programme is part of the partnership for documentary film heritage started up by Punto de Vista last year together with Cinéma du Réel (Paris). This collaboration is joined by the Filmoteca de Catalunya, which has just restored Tent City together with the rest of Miñuca Villaverde's work.

The closing screening, Sepio (Frans van de Staak, 1996) will round off the focus to be devoted by this year's festival, in collaboration with the Embassy of the Netherlands and the Eye Filmmuseum, to this Dutch film-maker, the first of its kind outside his country of origin. This will take place on Saturday 1st March after the Official Selection award ceremony.

 

Music at Punto de Vista

Punto de Vista will be complementing this packed programme of documentary film with a music programme featuring concerts, DJ sessions and radio programmes with live music. These activities are supported by the Navarre Music Commission, the bar Txintxarri and Radio 3.

With the aim of showcasing musical talent in Navarre, artists including Olaia Inziarte, Rig3l, Juárez, Edu Errea, Dayanna, Leeharvey and /Göo! will be appearing over the week at the bar Txintxarri and at Baluarte. The full programme can be consulted here.

 

New artistic director in 2026

This year is to be Manuel Asín's last as artistic director of Punto de Vista, continuing the convention of four-year stints established by the festival for this role. Therefore, after the end of the 19th edition the application process will be announced for all candidates wanting to submit their proposals to fill the position in 2026. In its 19 editions, Punto de Vista has had five art directors (in chronological order): Carlos Muguiro (2005—2009), Josetxo Cerdán (2010—2013), Oskar Alegria (2015—2017), Garbiñe Ortega (2018—2021) and Manuel Asín (2022—2025).

 

A responsible festival: family-friendly and sustainable

First several years Punto de Vista has run its playscheme: The Red Balloon, to make the festival more family-friendly. Thus, both audiences and pass holders can enjoy the programme while using this space for children from six months to twelve years old. It will be available from Thursday 27th February in the afternoon to Saturday 1st March. The playscheme is run together with CIMA, the association of women film-makers and audiovisual media, through the Parenting at Film Festivals collective. The Red Balloon is staffed by professionals from Ludoteka Zorionak Kids & Party and places can be booked in advance through the festival website.

On the other hand, Punto de Vista remains committed to environmental sustainability, taking measures in all areas and departments of the festival. Since 2024 we have taken a step further in this direction, estimating and offsetting our carbon footprint thanks to the cooperation of our team and all the people attending. This year we have reinforced our commitment and effort, using not just internal resources but also the cooperating venues for the job of collecting and analysing data.

 

Collaborating organisations

This year once again the festival will be working with a strong network of partners to boost its profile both nationally and internationally. Thus, in the forthcoming edition the festival once again has the support of organisations and institutions including ICAA, Acción Cultural Española, Fundación SGAE (as part of its internaitonalisaiton programme), Pamplona city council, Centro Huarte, EiTB, Instituto Navarro de la Juventud, Carné Joven, Filmoteca de Catalunya, Filmoteca de Galicia, Navarra Music Commission, Elías Querejeta Zine Eskola, Golem, Courtisane Festival, Radio 3, Docs & Talks and the Festival Scope platform. And for 2025 these are joined by new partners including Doc Alliance, the Netherlands embassy, Círculo de Bellas Artes, Eye Filmmuseum and The Theater of The Matters.

Finally, the festival will once again be seeking to foster professional networks though initiative, meetings and working sessions set up by Navarra Film Industry, NAPAR, Doklab Navarra, CIMA and (H)emen.