UNTIL SUNDAY 12/6
GENS PUMPS. Burjassot, 54
A woman has painted a stripe on her calf to simulate that she is wearing stockings, another walks through Granada in the company of a chicken. Situations today in Berlin (not so much at the time, when nylon stockings became very expensive and living with chickens was common) that photographers Joana Biarnés and Gianni Ferrari captured to portray that Spain in the mid-20th century in which our most distinguished filmmaker, Luis García Berlanga, gave birth to films that have entered the Spanish cinematographic Olympus. One week away from the Goya Awards in Valencia, within the Berlanga Year that celebrates the centenary of his birth, the Film Academy the exhibition opened in Bombas Gens Berlanguiano doing, first, a sweep of the cinematographic situation in Spain before Berlanga burst onto the scene, with photographs of actress R osita Díaz Gimeno—married to Juan Negrín's eldest son—going to Hollywood in 1934 or a portrait of Lola Flores, who in the forties triumphed with the show Zambra (from which came “The Blackberry” famous) with Manolo Caracol. From here we get into the matter, reviewing Berlanga's films with their photos and shooting plans, hand painted sketches, posters, scripts and storyboards along with magazines The Quail and images of the time that remind us how masterful Berlanga was in capturing the spirit of those times, to bathe it in humor and absurdity. The snapshot of a Christmas Campaign 1959 sneaks into the filming material of Placid (whose original title was Sit a poor person at your table), Franco at a shooting range lays the foundation for The national shotgun, a group of soldiers on the Ebro Front (1938) helps to understand the realistic pose of The heifer and a girl with balloons starring in a propaganda campaign for The Marshall Plan gives context to Welcome, Mr. Marshall! The nod to Valencia is made by photographers Robert Frank and Elliott Erwitt, who signs a pyrotechnic photograph of Valencia 1957 in the part of the exhibition dedicated to Calabuch, that invented town on the Mediterranean coast (Peniscola) competing to win the fireworks contest. An absolutely absurd and pathetic situation that is at the same time close and recognizable.. Twelve television screens that simultaneously broadcast a guirigai of Berlanga scenes pay tribute to one hundred performers who collaborated with the filmmaker throughout his career and the Goya bobblehead awarded by the Academy at its annual gala looks with a frown from inside a showcase at visitors who soak up the cinema that gives meaning to the term “Berlangian.”, recognized by the Royal Spanish Academy of Language in 2020 in his own right. S.M.
