BLUE FILES

KARPETA URDINAK

By Ander IRIARTE

GASTIBELTZA FILMAK - as PROD

Documentary - Completed 2022

More than 4,000 citizens were tortured in the context of the Basque conflict between 1960 and 2014. One of them was the filmmaker's facther. He and experts discuss the past, what torture is and how it affects the victims.

Festivals
& Awards

IDFA 2022
Frontlight
ssiff 2022
Zinemira
FipaDoc 2023
Impact
Censurados 2023
International competition, First Prize
Documenta Madrid 2023
National Competition
Docs Valencia 2023
Panorama
    • Year of production
    • 2022
    • Genres
    • Documentary
    • Countries
    • FRANCE, SPAIN
    • Languages
    • BASQUE, SPANISH
    • Duration
    • 113 mn
    • Director(s)
    • Ander IRIARTE
    • Writer(s)
    • Ander IRIARTE, Jorge GIL, Olatz RETEGI
    • Producer(s)
    • Katti POCHELU (GASTIBELTZA FILMAK)
    • Synopsis
    • Basque filmmaker Ander Iriarte always suspected that his father had been tortured by the Spanish police. But he wasn’t sure, because his father never spoke of the past. This changed when his father participated in an extensive research project into torture in the Basque Country between 1960 and 2014, promoted by the Basque Government’s Peace Plan. The research report, endorsed by the United Nations, demonstrated more than 4,000 cases of torture. Iriarte’s father broke after three days of interrogations and torture.

      The videotaped witness statements reveal horrific torture practices. To find out what torture is and what it does to victims, Iriarte interviewed psychiatrists, lawyers and other experts who conducted the study. They discuss in detail the Istanbul Protocol, adopted by the United Nations in 1999, which provided guidelines for the investigation and documentation of torture and other inhuman treatment. The disturbing conclusion is that torture is not the work of deranged sadists, but is systemically embedded in societies.