Directed by Alain Resnais and Robert Hessens • Documentary • 1949 • 14 minutes
In 1937, Spanish nationalists called on Nazi and Italian Fascist forces to bomb the Basque town of Guernica. The horrors of the bombing led Pablo Picasso to create perhaps his greatest work, “Guernica”: a massive painting powerfully representing the horrors of war.
Recently restored and digitized, GUERNICA is a short film featuring paintings, drawings and sculptures made by Picasso between 1902 and 1949. Accompanying the artworks is a dramatic piece by surrealist poet Paul Eluard, read by actor Maria Casares. In the first few minutes of the film, Picasso’s deeply human drawings evoke daily life. Then comes the bombing, with lives shattered and destroyed. Here, the focus is on “Guernica” itself, as the film spotlights details of the painting over a frenzied and disturbing score.
GUERNICA is one of a series of impressive short films on art made by the great French New Wave director Alain Resnais, early in his career.
Up Next in Spain
-
In Exile: A Family Film
Directed by Juan Francisco Urrusti Alonso • Documentary • 2017 • 124 minutes
The Spanish Civil War (1936-39) left a million dead and over 500,000 refugees. Mexico welcomed about 20,000. Among them were the filmmaker’s grandparents, parents, and some of their friends. In Exile: A Family Film tell...
-
On This Side of the World
Directed by David Trueba • Drama • With Vito Sanz, Anna Alarcón, Ondina Maldonado, Joaquín Notario, Janfri Topera, Zidane Barry • 2020 • 96 minutes
Alberto, a dull and indolent engineer, is fired from his company just as he plans to buy a house with his girlfriend and become parents. To cover it...
-
The Pinochet Case
Directed by Patricio Guzmán • Documentary • 2001 • 109 minutes
Augusto Pinochet, the general who overthrew President Salvador Allende of Chile in 1973, was the first dictator in Latin America—or the world—to be humbled by the international justice system since the Nuremberg trials.
THE PINOCHE...
1 Comment