Tabakalera, a contemporary art center in San Sebastián housed in a restored tobacco factory, hosted a conversation at the San Sebastián International Film Festival (SSIFF) on a question that matters: how to make cinema more inclusive. The panel, titled "Diversity and Inclusion On and Off Screen," examined two interconnected problems: how disability is represented in films, and how people with disabilities contribute to making them.
The perspective was notably British. Clare Baines, who works at the BFI (British Film Institute) as Disability Equality Lead—a role created years ago to champion disabled people's rights in film—moderated the full conversation, available in English. She began, as is customary at such events, with a self-description for anyone blind or partially sighted.
The first panelist, activist Shani Dhanda, brought a second-generation British perspective and offered a brisk, teachable definition of disability itself. Her core points: disability is not a condition but an experience that emerges when society builds barriers or holds prejudices. We should abandon the medical model—treating individuals while leaving an inaccessible world unchanged—for a social model that removes the barriers themselves. Disability can affect anyone, often temporarily, so accessibility benefits everyone. We should stop talking about equity and start eliminating inequity. Much of today's technology was invented to address some form of disability, which means accessibility is universal good.
If we aspire to a world without unnecessary barriers, why not imagine cinema that reflects that vision—rather than continuing to marginalize disability as it has for decades? The answer, suggested the second panelist, is to involve disabled people in filmmaking itself. Justin Edgar, a director and producer, showed behind-the-scenes footage from his own productions.
Casting disabled actors in disabled roles adds authenticity and credibility. But the work must go deeper: disabled people should shape the entire production, from script to cinematography—even when it increases costs. In the UK, dedicated funding exists precisely because authentic representation is impossible without disabled creators at the table. And the business case is simple: people with disabilities represent an enormous, neglected market.
Baines cited a BFI rule that makes particular sense: film funding in Britain is now tied to accurate representation of minorities. Edgar acknowledged that his 2010 film, in which non-disabled actor Andy Serkis played singer Ian Dury—who lived much of his life with significant motor difficulties—would never be greenlit today. Yet the same standard does not hold everywhere. The work of young Argentine filmmaker Federico Luis, shown at San Sebastián, illustrates why this matters.
Luis befriended Pehuén Pedre while assisting at an acting school for disabled people. They co-wrote a short film, Cómo ser Pehuén Pedre, in which Pedre teaches two non-disabled actors how to imitate him—specifically, how to obtain a disability certificate (which he considers a privilege, not a burden). The reversal is stunning: not an actor observing and mimicking another's disability, but a disabled person explaining his own—how to move his eyes, what tics to perform, what answers to give standard questions.
From this premise, Luis made his first feature, Simón de la montaña (screened in the Horizontes Latinos section), starring Lorenzo Ferro, one of the short's two actors. Ferro plays Simón, a newcomer to a group of disabled teenagers about whom little is known. He lacks a disability certificate, so his friend Pehuén tutors him on how to get one. Why Simón does this is deliberately unclear. Throughout the film, he never breaks character—and were it not for scenes with his mother and her partner, who treat him with mounting annoyance, you might believe Ferro is simply playing a disabled person rather than someone pretending to be one. His total immersion works: the other teenagers accept him because they know the truth. Through his eyes, we observe their adolescent lives from within and grasp how utterly ordinary they are, and how ordinary their families are too. Simón removes barriers through pure presence and acceptance. It is high-concept provocation about what authentic disability representation in cinema can be.