Carlos Saura: An American Cinematheque Retrospective

ABOUT THE SERIES:

Receiving the honorary award just a few days before his death, the Goya awards recognized Carlos Saura as, “one of the fundamental filmmakers in the history of Spanish cinema.” On a perpetual exploration of Spanish identity, he began making films during the Franco regime and continued until his death in early 2023 at the age of 91.

Through allegory-rich storytelling, Saura was able to dodge censors who controlled the country’s media. His third film THE HUNT, about a hunting trip gone awry, evoked memories of the brutal Spanish civil war. The year after Franco’s death, Saura won a special jury award at Cannes for CRÍA CUERVOS… which shifts between the difficult realities of a traumatic childhood in a broken country and the fantasy created to cope with it.

Saura’s later career involved youth and dance particularly the flamenco culture of southern Spain. With HURRY, HURRY!, Saura creates a classic of the quinqui or Spanish exploitation film genre. Using actual teenage delinquents, the group of kids descend into a hopeless oblivion of drugs, disco and grand theft auto.

Vividly capturing the flamenco culture and dance, Saura’s flamenco trilogy comprised of BLOOD WEDDING, CARMEN, and LOVE, THE MAGICIAN remain some of the greatest films on dance. Following legendary flamenco dancer and choreographer, Antonio Gades and his dance company as a fictionalized versions of themselves, the films follow rehearsals of iconic plays and operas from Georges Bizet and Federico García Lorca. This flamenco trilogy set the stage for a later exploration of the Argentine dance in the film TANGO.