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La caza [The Hunt] (Carlos Saura, 1966)
Sep
23
International Rabbit Day
One of the hunters, seen from the back, aims for a wild rabbit. When you look closely you can see the animal leap just out of frame. DP: Luis Cuadrado.
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El espíritu de la colmena [The Spirit of the Beehive] (Víctor Erice, 1973)
Sep
3
National Cinema Day
Ana (Ana Torrent) watching James Whale's Frankenstein (1931). DP: Luis Cuadrado.
One day, in a quiet village, a traveling movie theatre appears. The proprietor has no words for the miracle he brings in on the reels. When it's finally time, and the whole town is crammed into the crumbling impromptu playhouse, and the lights are dimmed, a word of warning. This is the story of Dr. #Frankenstein, it starts.
“Just close your eyes and call him… It's me, Ana… It's me Ana…”
– Teresa
The old folk in the audience remember their first brush with cinema, and life, and death. For sisters Ana (Ana Torrent) and Isabel (Isabel Tellería) it may be their first, and it may as well be real. The creature, Isabel assures her younger sister, is not dead. He's a spirit and you can call for him.
When you're little, everything is a miracle. Milagros is the name the maid answers too. And so does the landscape, the mushrooms, the heart, and the magic of cinema.
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El espíritu de la colmena [The Spirit of the Beehive] (Víctor Erice, 1973)
Aug
30
mushrooms
Little Ana (Ana Torrent) all but disappearing behind a for her almost too large ceramic bowl. DP: Luis Cuadrado.
“If you're not sure a mushroom's good, don't pick it. Because if it's bad, and you eat it, it's your last mushroom and your last everything too.”
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Peppermint Frappé (Carlos Saura, 1967)
Jun
30
Drive Your Corvette To Work Day
Producer Elías Querejeta (far left) and others pushing Geraldine Chaplin character Elena's Chevrolet Corvette C1. Behind the wheel actor José Luis López Vázquez (Julián). DP: Luis Cuadrado.
A chance encounter with a blonde drummer during the Holy Week in the village of Calanda leaves a deep impression on Julián (José Luis López Vázquez). When years later he reunites with his childhood friend Pablo, he finds that Pablo is married to bubbly cosmopolitan Elena (Geraldine Chaplin), the spitting image of the elusive drummer. Infatuated he tries to court her, but Elena sees nothing in the drab radiologist. Julián then turns his attention to his shy assistant Ana (also Chaplin) and grooms her into becoming the two unattainable women.
“Things last as long as they last.”
– Pablo
Saura's Peppermint Frappé takes #Hitchcock's Vertigo (1958) – indeed the peppermint green of the drink is an homage – with a twist of #Buñuel and serves it over an anti-#Francoist tale of self-doubting machismo obsessing over The Other. Even Elena's car, American instead of a much more obvious European model, dismisses fascist Spain's perceived superiority. Indeed the Generalisimo drove a Cadillac.
