All the goodness and the heroisms will rise up again,
then be cut down again and rise up.
It isn’t that the evil thing wins — it never will —
but that it doesn’t die.
Winter 1943.
In the tense calm of a borderland to which the echoes of a nearby war reach, Antoni and Sara, a young married couple are expecting their first child. It is a time of war in Europe and Andorra lives outside these conflicts. Nobody knows exactly what is going on or what they are fighting for, and surviving one more day in the mountains is the priority of the couple, who live a difficult life full of limitations.
The arrival of a family of Jews fleeing German persecution will disrupt life in the valley, filling it with uneasiness and uncertainty. Sara must face her own contradictions and decide whether to obey reason or instinct.
With the arrival of a sinister captain of the Gestapo, the past and family secrets that the snow has kept buried for years, are about to precipitate and unleash the drama.
The cold has reached the mountains and the hearts of the people.
Greta Fernández – Sara
Blow, winter wind, your bite is less cruel,
because no one sees it.
We live with this cold, which we will never again
be able to shake off..
Roger Casamajor – Antoni
I don’t ever want to have to tell my child
that I once killed a whole family,
just because I was scared.
Daniel Horvath – Lars Gunther
Bright men like myself will always
be the outsiders. That’s why we are banished
to the wilderness. I am sinner and a saint.
Adrià Collado – Joan
If it were up to me, you and the baby
would never want for a thing.
But for your husband, not even water.
Not a single drop.
Pedro Casablanc – Serafí
Antoni’s father did not die from a wrong foot.
I killed him.
Ksawery Szlenkier – Marian
We cannot wait so much time!
I have to get to Barcelona right away!
It’s very important!
This is a film about the nature of evil and hatred.
It is about the hatred that is inherited and constitutes one of the fundamental pillars of every family. The background of World War II and the arrival of a Jewish family fleeing German persecution to a village in Andorra is the excuse to address a family tragedy, local and intimate but always universal.
It also tells the story of a journey of initiation: the transformation of the protagonist, and her awareness through survival. Sara, in an inverted version of Little Red Riding Hood, learns that wolves exist and must be fought.
The story tells that we are not those good people we want to see reflected in the mirrors, but that, sometimes, we believe in revenge,
Here you will meet the truth of the cold, the hardness of the stones, rough as the characters burned skin. We are in the confines of a world that ends, inhabited by high mountains and gods indifferent to the human drama. And under their silent gaze, the earth is cold and damp, the clouds thick and the passions ravage the hearts of its inhabitants.
Al mal se’l pot combatre, però no sempre se’l pot guanyar.
It is a drama of survival about people of different origins, religions and cultures. It deals with the emotions and sensitivities that emerge from this contact surrounded by an overwhelming nature. It is about a family and how the past they thought buried emerges unleashing a wave of physical and emotional violence. Evil can be fought, but not always defeated.
in the justice of an eye for an eye, that we are capable of hating and loving in equal parts, and only in this way we will be able to survive in the most adverse circumstances. It is the eternal struggle between Good and Evil, which we all carry within us, and which will last as long as human beings exist.
I hope that The Burning Cold does not leave you indifferent and, after watching it, its ember falls on you like a gigantic slab and gets stuck in your soul; because this is a film that weighs and you can touch and smell it with your eyes. And, in its emotional story, it wants to stir the stomach and the most primal emotions.
Santi Trullenque
The earth is dirty, hard and surly... but it is pure,
honest and strong, like those who tread it every day.
Agustí Franch is a screenwriter and playwright and the author of FRED
the original play on which The Burning Cold is based.
Currently, and since 2012, he directs the Club Piolet, for Andorra Televisió.
In theater he is the author of texts such as “Tira-tira, o la fábrica de tiras”, winner of the 2002 SGAE Award for children’s and youth theater. “Lo que el viento se llevó”, winner of the 2005’s Xarxa award and the 2005 Young creators award. “Entre pocs i massa”, “Operación pañales”, or “Coitus, la comedia”, all three premiered at the Capitol Club in Barcelona. “Fred”, winner of the 50th Theatre Award Crédit Andorrà in 2015, “Exit”, produced by Escena Nacional de Andorra, or “Ximpanzé”, which after staying two seasons at the Teatre Gaudí in Barcelona, is currently on tour.
As a novelist he has published “Generacions”, “Sota la llei de Murphy”, with which he won the “Premio Ciudad de Badalona, 2005”, “El Tamarro”, “Wicca”, “La caja de música” and “L’home que feia núvols de sucre”.
As a scriptwriter he has worked in series for Televisión Española, such as “Happy House”, and “Laura”, for Televisió de Catalunya. He has been writer in shows such as “Anecdotario”, “Foto de familia”, or “(S)avis”. He is the creator of the children’s series “Les coses de Martina”, and in cinema, he is the co-writer of The Burning Cold.