Experiencing Interruptions?

Except death

Like every year, peasants, both men and women, sacrifice the animal in order to sustain themselves. A collective work that bonds several generations in a rural environment. A gathering of people focused on their tasks, engrossed in their thoughts, while time goes by. Mist, fire, blood, flesh and bones.

  • Adrián Viador
    Director
  • Adrián Viador
    Writer
  • Adrián Viador
    Producer
  • Xabier Erkizia
    Sound Designer
  • Project Title (Original Language):
    Menos a morte
  • Project Type:
    Documentary
  • Genres:
    etnographic, anthropological, contemplative, non fiction
  • Runtime:
    44 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    January 7, 2024
  • Production Budget:
    30,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    Spain
  • Country of Filming:
    Spain
  • Language:
    Galician
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    Yes
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Jury Prize - FIMMER - Festival Internacional Mediometrajes Manzanares el Real
    Manzanares el Real
    Spain
    April 6, 2024
    Spain
    Jury Prize
  • Best Galician Film Jury Prize - Semana de Cine de Lugo 46
    Lugo
    Spain
    September 26, 2024
    Best Galician Film Jury Prize
Director Biography - Adrián Viador

Adrián Viador was born in Lugo (Galicia, Spain) in 1985. He studied Dramatic Arts at Casa Hamlet Drama School, in A Coruña and has worked as an actor for over 25 years both in cinema, on television and on stage, as in dubbing and voice-over content.
He has lived in Madrid since 2005.
His interest in cinema led him to a major in writing and directing, studying with people like Enrique Urbizu, Óliver Laxe, Pedro Loeb and Javier Rodríguez de Fonseca (the latter two at Factoría del Guión School). In 2006, he put himself on the other side of the camera for the first time, as a production assistant in the documentary El País de Nomeacuerdo (by Guille Mealla). Since then, he has combined his work as an actor with his participation in various artistic projects (as assistant director, in production and editing). Among his most recent activities behind the camera, we can find the editing of the feature film Journey to Somewhere (directed by Helena de Llanos) and his first work as a director: Except Death, a contemplative half-length documentary portraying the tradition of pig-slaughter in Galicia (Awarded with the Jury Prize at the International Festival of Medium-Length Films of Manzanares El Real – FIMMER 2024).

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Director Statement

I was 7 years old when for the first time I was present and participated in the slaughter of a pig, what we call in Spanish a "matanza”. Such an intense experience has left me both with enticing memories and mixed emotions. On the one hand, there was the whole collective experience: family, friends and neighbours committed to the process, deeply involved in each task, in an almost sacred way. On the other hand, there was this direct contact with death.

Pascal Quignard said that “It isn’t clear when clean and dirty became separated in human societies and consciousness. When did the corpse appear and the anguished need to remove it from sight?”

The urge to do this film has always been latent in some way. It is not only related to an intimate connection with memory, but also works as an attempt at disclosure, when we look at reality. In these days, when aggressive capitalism extols physical beauty and youth, is there any space left for what perishes: for what is dirty? There is something profound, perhaps even beautiful, that occurs when these people of different generations gather together to execute the animal and deal with death at close quarters.

I cannot point out, at least consciously, any film that inspired me to make this. As my first venture into filmmaking, I needed to find my own way of relating to the camera, the people and spaces they inhabit. I decided to work without a script, just a few notes, texts and images that connected me to what I was looking for during the shoot. I wanted to meet what I felt was an ancestral beauty, of life and death. However, I did establish a series of technical rules: I could not interfere with what was being filmed, nor would I ask for any specific action to be carried out; I would not interview anyone in the film and, as the cameraman would be me, I decided that I could only look through the monitor, never from the outside. Thus, a very special relationship was created with both people and spaces. I became a fly that could circle around wherever the tension of the moment was and get very close, always in silence. When I finally had everything I needed, I handled the material during editing as if it were found footage, allowing the images to pierce me once more. And I realized that everything was there. Except death.