Pedro Almodóvar
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| Born: | September 24, 1949 Image:Flag of Spain.svg Calzada de Calatrava, Ciudad Real, Spain |
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| Occupation: | Filmmaker |
Pedro Almodóvar Caballero born September 24, 1949) is a two-time Academy Award-winning Spanish filmmaker. Since making his first commercial film in the 1980s, he has written, directed, acted in and/or produced nearly 30 films. His films are characterized by elements of melodrama and high camp.
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[edit] Early biography
Pedro Almodovar was born to a working class family in Calzada de Calatrava of Ciudad Real, a province of Castile-La Mancha in the administrative district of Almagro. His family moved to Cáceres in Extremadura when he was eight years of age and he attended a Catholic boarding school run by Salesian friars. His experiences in religious institutions, and the sexual abuse he witnessed, would serve as the inspiration for his film Bad Education (2004) (Spanish: La mala educación).
At the age of sixteen, Almodovar moved to Madrid. The cultural and economic stagnation of the Franco era discouraged the formation of a lively cinematic culture. Almodovar worked a number of odd jobs, including a stint selling used items in a flea-market called The Trail (Spanish: El Rastro). Almodovar's experiences among the underprivleged of Madrid would consistently resurface in his films. Eventually, Almodovar found full-time employment with Spain's national phone company, where he worked for twelve years as an administrative assistant. Steady employment enabled him to purchase his first camera, a Super 8.
In the early seventies, Almodovar grew interested in experimental cinema and theatre. He collaborated with the vanguard theatrical group, The Romantics (Spanish: Los Goliardos). Around 1972, Almodovar began making his first short films on his Super 8, and by the end of the seventies, he was also writing comics and contributing articles and stories to a number of countercultural magazines, such as Star and Vipers and Vibrations (Spanish: Víbora y Vibraciones).
Almodovar was a crucial figure in the Madrilene Movement (Spanish: La Movida Madrileña), a cultural renaissance that followed the fall of the Franco dictatorship. In addition to his cinematic work, Almodovar sang alongside Fabio McNamara in a punk-glam-rock parody duo, published a novella, Fire in the Guts (Spanish: Fuego en las entrañas), and, writing under the pseudonym "Patty Difusa" penned various articles for major newspapers and magazines, such as El País, Diario 16 and La Luna.
Almodovar made his first feature film, Pepi, Luci, Bom and Other Woman on the Heap (Spanish: Pepi, Luci, Bom y otras chicas del montón), in 1980 for merely £13,000. The film was based on his photo-novella, General Erections (Spanish: Erecciones Generales), previously published in the magazine, The Viper (Spanish: El Víbora). The film's success provided Almodovar with the financial and cultural capital to found his own production company, Desire (Spanish: El Deseo) in 1985 with his brother, Agustin. The first film produced by Desire was The Law of Desire (Spanish: La Ley del Deseo), released in 1986. In addition to Almodovar's own films, Desire has managed production for a variety of important directors, including Álex de la Iglesia, Guillermo del Toro, Daniel Calparsoro, Mónica Laguna, and Isabel Coixet.
[edit] Almodóvar's cinematic work
Almodóvar's films, similar in aesthetic style and technique to those of the Spanish director Eloy de la Iglesia, cultivate a naturalism that deconstructs the depiction of middle-class values, typical of Spanish cinema. His films tend to deal with the marginal existence of the urban underclass and are full of scandalous and provocative elements, such as corrupt cops, drug consumption, prostitution, maltreatment, precocious kids, homosexuality, desperate housewives and philosophical country hicks. All this is combined with strong irreverent humour that often include explicit scenes of a sexual nature, as the golden shower scene of his first 35mm film, Pepi, Luci, Bom and Other Woman on the Heap," attests.
Just like the surrealists, the occasional scandalous scene of bad taste is usually incorporated into Almodóvar's movies in order to perturb the morally haughty bourgeoisie and stilted intellectuals that feel they are above such unbecoming behaviour. Nonetheless, with the passage of time, Almodóvar has developed a more sophisticated and colourful sense of drama, closer to the classic melodramatic style of Douglas Sirk, and continues to improve his scriptwriting to the point where he has become a master of rhythm and structure. This progress was clearly evident in his breakout film of 1984, What Have I Done to Deserve This? (Spanish: ¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer esto?), which again featured one of his favoured actresses in Carmen Maura.
Later in Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down (Spanish: ¡Átame!), titled originally Cine X in the USA, a woman ends up falling in love with her kidnapper, and in Kika, a rape is trivialised. Almodóvar's sources of inspiration, nearly always autobiographical, also include Luis Buñuel, avante-garde art, folkloric culture and anti-clericalism.
1997's "Live Flesh" (Carne Tremula) showcased an altogether new calibre of filmmaking which has placed Almodóvar among the elite of world cinema. "All about my Mother" (Todo Sobre mi Madre), "Talk to Her" (Hable con ella), and "Bad Education" (Mala Educación) all garnered high critical acclaim, including an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film for "All About My Mother."
[edit] Theatrical re-release
In 2006, Sony Pictures Classics announced the theatrical re-release of eight of celebrated auteur Pedro Almodóvar’s greatest films.
Viva Pedro will open in New York and Los Angeles in August and expand throughout the United States this Autumn. The theatrical re-release will introduce new audiences to Almodóvar and at the same time present the films to his many fans in the manner which they are meant to be seen and appreciated.
The re-released films include Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, All About My Mother, Talk to Her, The Flower of My Secret, Live Flesh, Law of Desire, Matador and Bad Education.
Brand new prints have been made of all eight films. Several of these titles have not been shown in theaters since their original release. All of the films have been withdrawn from the DVD marketplace to accommodate their theatrical re-release (while Matador and Law of Desire have never been released on DVD).
This banner year for Almodóvar will conclude with the nationwide release of his newest film Volver, opening in New York and Los Angeles on November 3rd and playing throughout America during the year end holiday season.
[edit] Trivia
- Almodóvar often uses symbolism and metaphorical techniques to portray circular storylines.[citation needed]
- He was granted the honorary title of "Duke of Trémula" by author Javier Marías, reigning King of Redonda.<ref>[1]</ref>
- His films often portray strong female characters and transsexuals.
- His late mother Francisca Caballero and brother Agustín Almodóvar often appear in cameo roles in his movies.
[edit] Quote
"Yes, I am a gay man, but I love breasts."<ref>cited by Roger Ebert</ref>
[edit] Filmography
[edit] Notes and references
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[edit] External links
- Viva Pedro Official website of the Viva Pedro series, featuring the theatrical re-release of 8 of the celebrated auteur's films.
- Pedro Almodóvar at the Internet Movie Database
- Official website includes comments on many of his movies and a diary on the making of his new one, Volver
- Almodovar Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)
- Interview with Pedro Almodovar from 1996 about The Flower of My Secret
- Interview with Pedro Almodovar about Talk to Her
- Biography of Pedro Almodóvar MundoCine
- Pedro Almodóvar's Complete Filmography, Reviewed
- Pedro Almodovar & Volver Full production notes, images and many more on Volver.
| Pedro Almodóvar |
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Pepi, Luci, Bom y otras chicas del montón (1980) • Laberinto de pasiones (1982) • Entre tinieblas (1983) • ¿Qué he hecho yo para merecer ésto? (1984) • Matador (1986) • La ley del deseo (1987) • Mujeres al borde de un ataque de nervios (1988) • ¡Átame! (1990) • Tacones lejanos (1991) • Kika (1993) • La flor de mi secreto (1995) • Carne trémula (1997) • Todo sobre mi madre (1999) • Hable con ella (2002) • La mala educación (2004) • Volver (2006) |
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Categories: Articles to be expanded | Articles with unsourced statements | Pedro Almodóvar films | Spanish film directors | Best Original Screenplay Academy Award winners | Prince of Asturias Award winners | Castilian-La Mancha people | Spanish agnostics | LGBT directors | LGBT people from Spain | 1949 births | Living people
