Roberto F. Canuto and Xu Xiaoxi’s short film screened at the Bolinas Gallery, in the Gallery Arthouse Popup Screenings of the Californian festival, held from 17 to 20 September 2026.
IUS of Time, co-directed by Roberto F. Canuto and Xu Xiaoxi, was part of the official programme of the 4th Bolinas Film Festival, in Bolinas, California. Produced by Almost Red Productions with the support of the Principality of Asturias and the Asturias Paraíso Natural Film Commission, the film screened at the Bolinas Gallery, within the Gallery Arthouse Popup Screenings that ran throughout the festival week.
The selection brings the film back to the San Francisco Bay Area, where it won Best Cinematography at the Silicon Valley Queer Film Festival this year, and adds another American stop to a route that began with its international premiere in Miami.
IUS of Time at the 4th Bolinas Film Festival
🎬 Festival: 4th Bolinas Film Festival · Bolinas, California, United States
🏛 Organised by Bolinas Film Festival, Inc.
📅 Dates: 17–20 September 2026
🎞 Section: Official programme · Gallery Arthouse Popup Screenings, Bolinas Gallery
🇺🇸 The film’s return to California after the Silicon Valley Queer Film Festival
🎥 Film: IUS of Time (IUS del tiempo) · Spain · 2025 · 25 min · Drama, Rural, LGBTIQ+
Festival: bolinasfilmfestival.com
Four days of cinema on the West Marin coast
Bolinas is a coastal village in West Marin, about an hour north of San Francisco. Its festival, run by the non-profit Bolinas Film Festival, Inc., reached its fourth edition this year and used the village itself as the venue: the Calvary Starlight Theater, the Bolinas Gallery, the Coast Cafe and Smiley’s Saloon, with birdwatching walks, a redwood forest immersion and a farm tour between screenings. The organisers describe it as a celebration of cinema, community and place.
The 2026 programme opened on Thursday 17 September with a gala and a short film series, continued on Friday with American Pachuco, brought four short blocks and two feature spotlights on Saturday, and closed on Sunday with Reggae Girlz and a free programme of films by local filmmakers.
IUS of Time: cheese caves, amestao and two men who were not looking for each other
IUS of Time was shot entirely in rural Asturias, in northern Spain: in the Picos de Europa, in the cheese caves of Cabrales and across the municipalities of Piloña, Cabrales and Onís, in villages such as Biedes and Asiegu. It is spoken in Spanish and in amestao, the mix of Spanish and Asturian still heard every day in those villages, and it was made with a small crew working inside the real places and the real trade it portrays.
Xuan spends his life in the caves where Cabrales cheese matures, an underground, slow and physical craft that the film follows without explaining it. Luca films that work, and in filming it he begins to see the man doing it. What happens between them is told mostly through silences, gestures and the work of two pairs of hands.
The film also keeps a specific idea at its centre: the lives a small rural community allows and the lives it quietly puts away. Xuan has spent decades hiding his homosexuality under the weight of a village where everyone knows everyone. Luca arrives from a generation for which that concealment is no longer obvious, and the distance between the two is the real subject of the film.
IUS of Time, more than a year on the road: 73 selections on five continents
Since its 2025 premiere, IUS of Time has gathered more than 70 official selections across five continents, screenings in 30 countries and 9 awards and distinctions, which makes it one of the most internationally circulated Asturian fiction short films of recent years.
Its international premiere was at the 27th OUTshine International Film Festival in Miami, and it later received the Director’s Choice Award at the 45th Thomas Edison Film Festival, an Oscar-qualifying festival in the United States, which brought the film into the festival’s 2026 touring programme across American cultural venues. Its two most recent awards arrived this year: Best LGBTQIA+ Film at the 3rd Power24 International Film Festival in Durban, South Africa, and the Audience Award for Best Narrative Short at the 5th Pillusion Film Festival in Tyrol, Austria. It has also been selected at the 53rd Huesca International Film Festival (Oscar and Goya qualifying), the 31st Chéries-Chéris of Paris, the 43rd Reeling of Chicago, the 16th KASHISH Pride Film Festival of Mumbai, the 24th Beijing Queer Film Festival, the 27th ReelOut of Canada and the 63rd FICX of Gijón/Xixón. The full list of festival selections and awards is available on the film’s page.
Technical details
- Original title: IUS del tiempo · International title: IUS of Time
- Spain · 2025 · 25 min 48 s · colour
- Languages: Spanish and Asturian (amestao)
- Subtitles available: English, French, Italian, Portuguese (European and Brazilian), Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Spanish
- Genre: drama · rural · LGBTIQ+
- Directed, written and edited by Roberto F. Canuto and Xu Xiaoxi · Screenplay with Enrique Pérez Romero
- Cinematography: Fran Córdoba
- Cast: Manuel Pizarro, Pelayo Carrizo, Andy Almar, Laura Ubach, Martina Bueno, Pablo Valdés
- Production: Almost Red Productions, with the support of the Principality of Asturias and the Asturias Paraíso Natural Film Commission
- Poster design: Ola Podgorska
- Programming and press enquiries: info@almostred.com
Questions about IUS of Time
What is IUS of Time about?
A young photographer arrives in an Asturian village to work on a personal project and stays at the home of an ageing cheesemaker who has spent his life hiding who he is. The film follows the unexpected bond that grows between them.
Where was it shot?
Entirely in rural Asturias, in northern Spain: the Picos de Europa, the cheese caves of Cabrales and the municipalities of Piloña, Cabrales and Onís.
What language is it in?
Spanish and amestao, the mixed Spanish and Asturian spoken in the area. Subtitles are available in seven languages.
What is its festival record?
More than 70 official selections across five continents, screenings in 30 countries and 9 awards, including the Director’s Choice Award at the 45th Thomas Edison Film Festival in the United States.
Who directed it?
Roberto F. Canuto and Xu Xiaoxi, who have been working together since 2008 between Spain and China.
More information
Official page of IUS of Time
Complete list of festival selections and awards
Short Focus Film Festival
Roberto F. Canuto and Xu Xiaoxi
Watch the official trailer
Cover photo: analogue behind-the-scenes photograph by Elmer Guevara, with Manuel Pizarro as Xuan, and the festival laurels. © Almost Red Productions
