Carlos Saura

Carlos Saura (born January 4, 1932, Huesca, Spain—died February 10, 2023, Madrid) was a Spanish film director who analyzed the spirit of Spain in tragedies and flamenco-dance dramas.

(Read Martin Scorsese’s Britannica essay on film preservation.)

Saura grew up in Madrid and began directing feature films while teaching at the Official School of Cinematography (1957–63). La caza (1965; The Hunt) was his first violent indictment of Spanish society under Francisco Franco. Saura’s bitter El jardin de las delicias (1970; The Garden of Delights) was delayed, then mutilated by Spanish censors. Ana y los lobos (1972; Anna and the Wolves) was also delayed by the censors; in it a governess in a crumbling mansion is beset by brothers who symbolize, according to Saura, “the three monsters of Spain: perversion of religiosity, repressed sexuality, and the authoritarian spirit.” His La prima Angélica (1973; Cousin Angelica) was the first Spanish film to present the Spanish Civil War from the viewpoint of the losing Republican cause. It was shown uncensored but provoked bomb attacks in Spanish theatres.

After the death of Franco in 1975, Saura usually avoided political content. His trilogy of flamenco-dance dramas—Bodes de sangre (1981; Blood Wedding), Carmen (1983), and El amor brujo (1986; Love the Magician)—were innovative versions of classic stories, done in collaboration with choreographer–lead actor–dancer Antonio Gades and his company. Carmen, based on Prosper Mérimée’s 1845 novella, included musical passages from Georges Bizet’s 1875 opera and fused rehearsal, performance, and a contemporary mirror of Mérimée’s plot; long portions of the film were danced without dialogue. Saura’s later movies included El Dorado (1988); Tango (1998), which received an Academy Award nomination for best foreign film; and Salomé (2002). He also helmed such documentaries as Fados (2007); Flamenco, Flamenco (2010); Jota de Saura (2016), about the traditional Spanish dance and song; and Renzo Piano: The Architect of Light (2018), in which the director and the Italian architect explore the connection between architecture and film.