Carlos Saura, the Spanish director who dared to challenge the censorship under Franco-Corriere.it has died

Carlos Saura, one of the greatest directors in the history of Spanish cinema, died today at the age of 91 in Madrid, due to respiratory failure. The Spanish press reported it. Director of «The Hunt», «Frappé alla mint», «Elisa, vita mia» and «Flamenco», during the Franco regime he fought against censorship while recounting the evils of Spain. Saura was due to collect the 2023 Goya Award of Honor tomorrow evening at the Goya Awards ceremony to be held in Seville. An award for which he had expressed his gratitude, saying: «I was lucky in life doing what attracted me the most: I directed cinema, theatre, opera and I drew and painted all my life».

After passing through the Institute of Cinematographic Research and Experiences of Madrid, Carlos Saura directed the short films «La tarde del domingo», «Cuenca» and «El pequeño río Manzanares». Thanks to his brother, the painter Antonio Saura, he comes into contact with the director and film producer Pere Portabella, and together they revolutionize the history of Spanish cinema in 1959 with their first feature film, «Los golfos» (1960). This story of six friends trying to get out of marginality through bullfighting can be considered the starting point of the New Spanish Cinema. It was also the first time that Carlos Saura attended the Cannes Film Festival. «Los golfos» was also Saura’s first encounter with censorship, a tension that would remain alive in his next film, «La caza» (1965), awarded at the Berlin Film Festival, and in all his films produced by Elías Querejeta in the following decade.

«Mint frappé» (1967), «Lo stress è tre, tre» (1968), «La madriguera» (1969) and «Ana y los lobos» (1970) mark the beginning of his relationship with the producer and with a series of actors such as José Luis López Vázquez or Geraldine Chaplin, with whom he also had a long romantic relationship. Furthermore, they represent the birth of a symbolism whose roots go back to Buñuel, the director from whom Carlos Saura drew the greatest inspiration. In the 70s Saura directed some of his masterpieces. «Cousin Angélica», for example, a film in which he shares his childhood memories. «Suppose, and this is a rather trivial example, that if for Proust childhood, his childhood, is a series of more or less poetic details about a family environment, for me those memories are much more violent: it is a bomb falling on my school, and a bloody girl with glass in her face,” he told Enrique Brasó in his monographic book on the director.

«La cugina Angelica» (1974) also made history for its eventful premiere. Far-right groups lashed out at the film when word got out that one of the characters had an arm in a cast raised as if in a Falangist salute. An attempt was made to steal the film from the Amaya cinema in Madrid and the Balmes cinema in Barcelona caught fire. With «La cugina Angelica» and his following film, «Cría cuervos» (1976), with Geraldine Chaplin and Ana Torrent, Saura won the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. After «Elisa, vita mia» (1977), «Gli occhi bendati» (1978) and «Mamà completes 100 years» (1979), Saura makes a leap in his career by directing «In hurry in hurry» (1981), awarded with the Golden Bear in Berlin.

From his collaboration with Antonio Gades, a musical trilogy will take shape consisting of «Bodas de sangre – Blood Wedding» (1981), «Carmen» (1983), awarded in Cannes, and the ambitious «L’amore sorcerone» (1986) . This turn, which continues to baffle admirers of the first part of his production, nevertheless reveals the enormous creative freedom of Carlos Saura. «He It seems to me that I have done in every moment what I thought I could do. If you ask me where I’m going… I don’t know either. I am very intuitive. And I say that my cinema is progressing by leaps and bounds », he explained to Enrique Brassó. At the end of 2022, the latest film by the Aragonese filmmaker was released in theaters, the documentary «Las paredes ablandan», dedicated to the origins of art and its relationship with the most avant-garde trends.