Pedro Almodóvar: "With what is happening, how is it possible to have a right like the one we have"

• Venice Film Festival. Pedro Almodóvar: "My greatest dream is to stay alive"

'The human voice

', the latest film by Pedro Almodóvar, shares with the literature of the urns, that strange and borgian tribe, the paradoxical vocation for universal particularity.

As in the case of these shepherds whose entire history of literature could fit into a single word, here

In the film with which the filmmaker opens in English, starring

and inspired by the work of Jean Cocteau that already appeared in both '

and '

', the director sums up a good part of his creed and compiles each and every one of his concerns (or almost).

One could even say that more than simply exposing his obsessions, he frees them.

The film that left the past Venice Film Festival literally voiceless "dares" now to pose and pose a challenge: Why can only feature films be released in theaters?

Since Wednesday, and in an unprecedented way, a short film has come to the cinema ready to beat a whole pandemic.

"I wanted to recover the spirit of the debutante. Short films always allow you to do things that you never indulge in a feature film," says Almodóvar by way of a declaration of intent.

He says that he was moved by the image of a woman who, like Carmen Maura long ago, looks out over a railing and from there contemplates the line of the sky.

adds.

And the reason is that the entire film teaches the artifice that sustains it.

Everything takes place within a set that is known and exhibited as such.

And in the middle, a woman

.

That is, a perfectly

woman

.

The fact that

, in his conscious unconsciousness, ends up being a confined film that rises against confinement is attributed by Almodóvar to that strange coincidence with destiny manners.

Filming began before the state of alarm in alarm and there it was interrupted to be resumed in July.

Then there is the matter of English.

Almodóvar does not hide that he wanted to test himself as a first step for all things to come.

"I direct by ear and I did not know if I was going to be able to appreciate the variations in a language that is not my own. Let's say that I have achieved it at 75%", he says, stops and, in his own way, contradicts himself: " Anyway, in this case, the fact that such a melodramatic text has not been shot in Spanish achieves a certain distance that benefits the result.

.

It was therefore not a simple idiomatic experiment.

"I always had the idea of ​​doing something very personal that later ended up being more accessible than imagined," he says.

So affordable that now, when everyone leaves theaters, the film reaches them even with a grand premiere

.

Or event.

Suddenly, the limited duration is a value in a time in which it is convenient not to be locked up longer than necessary.

"The dreamed destination was the theater, although it did not count on it. I consider it a miracle and also a moral obligation," he says, and from the last assessment a storm falls on account of the emptiness that the

are making in the rooms: "I It seems ... I don't know how to qualify it ... You can't ask the market for solidarity, the market works for its own reasons,

And above all, unprecedented selfishness. Besides, I don't think they will win anything. How will we see the last Bond in two years? It will have grown old ... I am furious against the '

' ".

It is clear.

Tilda Swinton and Pedro Almodóvar at one point during the filming of 'The human voice' EL DESEO

Be that as it may,

' is not against anything, but in favor of almost everything.

It is first and foremost an optimistic movie.

And feminist.

"The ortiginal monologue is now an act of revenge. When I was confronted again with Cocteau's text, I realized that I did not identify with him. If I had wanted to respect it fully, I would have had to make a period film because

rewrote 80%. I needed to give the character of Tilda all moral autonomy ... It is an act of liberation ... In my work, women are all powerful. "

Does this mean that in the need to rewrite it shares the revisionist commitment of what has been called the culture of cancellation?

That seems very inappropriate to me.

I remember when I was on the American tour, I saw how they canceled a Hitchcock cycle in the heat of the Metoo boil.

One group protested the director's behavior with the actresses.

I find it scandalous because no that has nothing to do with cinema.

You cannot review everything from '

to Sam Peckinpah's cinema through all of Hitchcock's cinema, on account of the new feminism.

It is very unfair with the cinema.

Of course Sam Peckinpah is a misogynist.

We already knew it.

But that doesn't make me like his movies any less.

We are in the eternal confusion of the artist with his work.

Hitchcock's

would not have been released now or would have had a lot of trouble.

We can't allow it ... I think of Woody Allen and the actors who deny him because they are simply in the Oscar race ... Anyway.

The excursion is worth as much to clarify his position as to be surprised that no one has messed with him yet.

"I remember that with '

' I had problems in Berlin.

It's weird, but everything that has to do with fluids is considered offensive or in bad taste ... ", he affirms and concludes:" It seems that I have survived. "

Almodóvar insists that his film sums him up and, in his own way, points to the future.

'

' repeats each of the common places that have defined it and rewrites them at the same time.

From inside.

And in that coming and going in time, he comes face to face with reality.

The film and, according to what was said, himself.

The first time he used Cocteau's text was in 1986 in 'The Law of Desire' at a crucial moment in the history of Spain.

Now he does it again and the film is released the same day that the extreme right presents a motion of censure ... There is something of a perverse circle, what we are experiencing in our society is for me ... I think that democracy has weakened a lot because of it. misuse of it by the parties of the right.

Every day I am a little more scandalized.

I cannot believe the level of impudence, stupidity and also contempt for all of us ... They must think that we are idiots.

How could they want to sell the Gürtel judgment, for example, as a relief!

Everything slows down and more so in a time when, as in a perfect storm, we have all the crises together.

With what is happening, how is it possible to have a right like the one we have that makes any action by the Government totally impossible.

And after the new storm, back to '

', a prodigy that summarizes the world in 30 minutes.

In one word perhaps.

It is so.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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