Birdsong

For his second feature film, Albert Serra was inspired by a traditional Catalan Christmas carol, "El cant dels ocells". In luminous black and white, he tells the biblical legend of the Three Kings, who follow the "Magi" to find the newborn baby Jesus. He focuses on their journey, which takes on epic proportions. Shot partly in the mountains of Iceland, partly inland in the Canary Islands, the film balances the classical and the profane, as Serra focuses on the paradoxical moments before the birth of Christianity, a time when the Three Kings are just three men looking for something to follow. "Less a retelling of the Nativity story than a dream about it, filtered... through a sensibility that recalls Luis Buñuel and Samuel Beckett." – A. O. Scott, The New York Times

Keywords

  • Directors Focus: Albert Serra
  • Festival de Cannes
  • Filmgalerie 451
  • Films Spain
  • Sooner Exclusives
  • Sooner Exclusives: Stories that Matter
  • Spirituality
  • religion
  • travel

Actors

  • Montse Triola
  • Lluís Carbó
  • Victoria Aragonés
  • Mark Peranson

Director

  • Albert Serra

Drama


1h 38min


16+

CA


DE

EN

Spain
2008
The Three Wise Kings travel in search of the Messiah, with unexpected obstacles on the way.

The Three Wise Kings travel in search of the Messiah, with unexpected obstacles on the way.


For his second feature film, Albert Serra was inspired by a traditional Catalan Christmas carol, "El cant dels ocells".


In luminous black and white, he tells the biblical legend of the Three Kings, who follow the "Magi" to find the newborn baby Jesus. He focuses on their journey, which takes on epic proportions.


Shot partly in the mountains of Iceland, partly inland in the Canary Islands, the film balances the classical and the profane, as Serra focuses on the paradoxical moments before the birth of Christianity, a time when the Three Kings are just three men looking for something to follow.


"Less a retelling of the Nativity story than a dream about it, filtered... through a sensibility that recalls Luis Buñuel and Samuel Beckett." – A. O. Scott, The New York Times

Festivals

Cast & Crew