Elías Querejeta Award for Esther García

In its third edition, the Film Academy awards Esther García the Elías Querejeta Award, an award created to recognize producers who take risks in the creative development of their craft, betting on the internationalization of Spanish cinema and the careers of new filmmakers.

Esther García has a 50-year career dedicated to Spanish cinema. A profession that for her is “a way of life.” Theirs is a production model associated with authorial independence, which operates from the production company The Desire to ensure that authors “turn their dreams into reality without having to give up anything.”

García has received the news with “special enthusiasm” and in a sweet cinematographic moment, with his latest production, directed by Oliver Laxe, Sirat, awarded at Cannes and with Pedro Almodóvar's next film in full filming, bitter christmas.

Being honored with an award named after Elías Querejeta makes Esther García especially happy. "He is a reference for all independent producers. He was a charismatic person, full of passion for what he did. He is without a doubt the producer who has inspired me the most," acknowledges this professional, who has also left his own mark on the way of producing in Spain.

"There are many colleagues who have worked with me and who feel that we have a different way of doing things. I really liked listening, putting myself in the other person's shoes, understanding what the difficulties are and from there putting in the means, the energy, everything that is necessary to do it. Without neglecting that this is a pyramid," he explains.

García also claims the role of the producer as a creator. "We spend our lives making creative decisions and the first is choosing the project," he highlights, as well as "the ability to motivate, to create in the team that passion of all of us together. I think that has been one of my missions," he adds, who in El Deseo alone has made 55 works possible.

He joined the company a year after its creation and began a professional tandem with the brothers Pedro and Agustín Almodóvar, whom he met in Matador in 1986, where he worked as a production assistant. Since El Deseo, he has worked alongside the director from La Mancha on all the subsequent titles in his filmography.

“Tardé mucho en dar el paso a la producción. Gracias a Agustín y Pedro Almodóvar cuando lo dí se me dio bien”, rememora García, que señala su compromiso con la obra de Almodóvar –”¿Cómo puedo hacer que Pedro convierta sus sueños en realidad, cómo hacer para que no tenga que renunciar a cosas? Esta ha sido mi misión”– y las posibilidades de impulsar a otros autores desde El Deseo–”me ha permitido estar en un lugar desde el que era más sencillo llegar a otros proyectos, soñar, pensar que podrían hacerse más cosas”–.

Álex de la Iglesia, Isabel Coixet, Lucrecia Martel, Guillermo del Toro, Diego Galán, Damián Szifron, Belén Macías, Dunia Ayaso and Félix Sabroso, Pablo Trapero and Daniel Calparsoro are some of the filmmakers with whom Esther García has worked, who throughout her career has promoted new directors and co-productions with Argentina and has not neglected documentary film.

Winner of six Goya Awards, three as production director for Mutant Action, All About My Mother y The secret life of words; and three as a producer for Pain and glory, Return y wild tales, Esther García also received the National Cinematography Award 2018. The Elías Querejeta 2025 Award is now added to these recognitions.

"I think I am loved and respected, what more can I ask for?" says the producer whose greatest satisfaction is "finding a revolutionary project. Reading scripts is the moment in which you can dream." He assures that there is nothing that interests him more than a challenge and proof of this is Mutant Action, where "we created everything from scratch: ships, saucers, special effects. This had not been done in Spain"; or the most recent Sirat, which he defines as “transgressive, completely on the sidelines.”

Supporting interesting directors whose work moves you is another of the driving forces of this production company that points out the importance of the gaze. "Isabel Coixet is a clear example of a woman narrating, of the difference between men and women regarding where they look from and where the stories they want to tell come from. They are not better or worse, they are different," she explains.

En el futuro le gustaría “seguir apoyando a las mujeres, que sintieran la libertad que sintió Oliver Laxe o Álex de la Iglesia haciendo sus películas, escribiendo algo sin pensar si iba a ser caro o barato, algo que los conmueva”, concluye esta productora cuya historia va desde un pequeño pueblo segoviano hasta convertirse en una de las mujeres más importantes del cine español.

Esther García, el arte de la producción

Comienza su andadura en 1975, casi por casualidad, colaborando como secretaria en la película Pim, pam, pum… ¡Fuego!, by Pedro Olea. Based on that experience, the goal is to be part of the Spanish cinema family. Then the series would come Curro Jimenez, where he met directors such as Joaquín and Rafael Romero Marchent, Pilar Miró, Mario Camus, Francisco Rovira Beleta and Antonio Drove.

Mariano Ozores, Fernando Colomo, Fernando Trueba, Gonzalo Suárez and Emilio Martínez-Lázaro are also some of the filmmakers with whom he has worked before his time in El Deseo.

Throughout her extensive career she has served as a meritorious secretary and production assistant, production manager, production director and, since the 2000s, she has devoted herself fully to her role as producer. My life without me, Defrost, Bad education, The secret life of words, Return, My prison yard, Everything about my mother, Broken hugs, The skin I live in, Passenger lovers, Wild Stories, The Clan, Juliet, Pain and glory, Parallel mothers y The next room These are some of the films of our cinema that this professional has produced; to which are added short films such as The human voice y strange way of life; documentaries like The landless, Eyengui, God of sleep, With a broken leg, Sends eggs y The silence of others; and the series Women for TVE.