Faire la parole(2017)

Faire la parole is a documentary that opens with a Basque author in political exile recounting a childhood where he was forced to hide his language as something shameful. The film then follows young people from the French and Spanish Basque regions—Nora, whose newspaper was shut down by the Guardia Civil in 2003, and teenagers Aitor, Ana, and Ortzi—as they navigate the tension between preserving their native tongue and the pressure of centralist nation-states. Shot with luminous clarity by cinematographer Raphael O'Byrne, the film captures rare, intimate conversations between these characters across generations. What emerges is a portrait of a secret community bound by the shared struggle to reclaim a suppressed language. The documentary moves beyond political abstraction into lived experience, following these new friends through the Basque landscape as they grapple with identity, family loyalty, and linguistic resistance.