This guide to Spanish film documents the film industry's interpretation of the isolating effects of the cultural traditionalism of the early twentieth century to the expanding international popularity of such films as Trueba's "Belle Epoque," Aranda's "Amantes," and Bigas Luna's "Jamon, Jamon," and such actors as Victoria Abril, Carmen Maura, and Antonio Banderas. This is the first volume in a new Greenwood series that discusses, historically and critically, films, directors, and actors in film industries throughout the world. Each volume will include a detailed historical introduction and will provide an in-depth treatment of the most important films and individuals involved in the industry. End-of-entry bibliographies provide sources for further reading and appendixes provide additional useful information. The Guides will be valuable to scholars, students, and film buffs.

Spanish cinema is in many ways a microcosm of the tensions and conflicts that have shaped the evolution of the nation over the course of this century. Spanish film as a cultural institution is rarely divorced from the political and social currents that have shaped the larger Spanish culture torn as it was between tendencies of localism and internationalism. It languished in industrial and artistic underdevelopment for many years under Franco; it is now, however, experiencing international recognition while remaining rooted in the specificity of its own popular cultural styles.

The Routledge Companion to Latin American Cinema is the most comprehensive survey of Latin American cinemas available in a single volume. While highlighting state-of-the-field research, essays also offer readers a cohesive overview of multiple facets of filmmaking in the region, from the production system and aesthetic tendencies, to the nature of circulation and reception. The volume recognizes the recent "new cinemas" in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico, and, at the same time, provides a much deeper understanding of the contemporary moment by commenting on the aesthetic trends and industrial structures in earlier periods. The collection features essays by established scholars as well as up-and-coming investigators in ways that depart from existing scholarship and suggest new directions for the field.

The Routledge Companion to Latin American Cinema is the most comprehensive survey of Latin American cinemas available in a single volume. While highlighting state-of-the-field research, essays also offer readers a cohesive overview of multiple facets of filmmaking in the region, from the production system and aesthetic tendencies, to the nature of circulation and reception. The volume recognizes the recent "new cinemas" in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico, and, at the same time, provides a much deeper understanding of the contemporary moment by commenting on the aesthetic trends and industrial structures in earlier periods. The collection features essays by established scholars as well as up-and-coming investigators in ways that depart from existing scholarship and suggest new directions for the field.

This collection of original essays focuses on the cross-currents and points of contact among Spain, Portugal and Latin America and their impact on the regions' film industries. This book focuses on the cross-currents and points of contact in film production among so-called Hispanic countries (Spain, Portugal and Latin America), and in particular the impact that co-production and supranational funding initiatives are having on both the film industries and the films of Latin America in the twenty-first century. Together with chapters that discuss and further develop transnational approaches to reading films in the Hispanic and Latin American context, the volume includes chapters that focus on funding initiatives, such as IBERMEDIA, that are aimed at Spain, Portugal and Latin America. An analysis of such initiatives facilitates a nuanced discussion of the range of meanings afforded to the term transnationalism: from the workings of those driven by economic imperatives, such as co-productions and 'Hispanic' film festivals, to the cultural, for example the invention of a marketable 'Latinamericaness' in Spain, or a 'Hispanic aesthetic' elsewhere. Stephanie Dennison is Reader in Brazilian Studies at the University of Leeds

Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura, who began his career under the censorship of Franco's regime, has forged an international reputation for his unique cinematic treatment of emotional and spiritual responses to repressive political conditions. In films such as Carmen and El Dorado, where reality and fantasy are deliberately fused together, Saura reveals the illusions of Franco's mythologized Spain--a chaste, Catholic, and heroic Spain of the Golden Age--that tend to isolate Spaniards from the rest of Europe, from each other, and from their own individuality. In this first English-language book on Saura, Marvin D'Lugo looks at the social and artistic forces behind this film auteur's highly personal cinema. Tracing Saura's career over three decades, D'Lugo discusses each work from Hooligans (1959), a realist film about a Madrid street-gang member trying to become a bullfighter, to The Dark Night (1989), a film dealing with the persecution of the religious reformer St. John of the Cross in the late sixteenth century. Throughout he argues that Saura's cinematic style results from a highly original response to the political and historical constraints of Spanish culture. D'Lugo shows how in order to explore the complex cultural politics of "Spanishness" as it was institutionalized under Franco, Saura frames his narrations through the eyes of characters who question the forces that shape personal and collective identity. Moving beyond the limits of traditional auteur studies, this book addresses the relationship between the filmmaker and the cultural ideology that historically has thwarted and manipulated the expressions of individuality in Spanish society.

Perhaps the best-known Spanish filmmaker to international audiences, Pedro Almodovar gained the widespread attention of English-speaking critics and fans with the Oscar-nominated Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and the celebrated dark comedy Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!. Marvin D'Lugo offers a concise, informed, and insightful commentary on a preeminent force in modern cinema. D'Lugo follows Almodovar's career chronologically, tracing the director's works and their increasing complexity in terms of theme and the Spanish film tradition. Drawing on a wide range of critical sources, D'Lugo explores Almodovar's use of melodrama and Hollywood genre film, his self-invention as a filmmaker, and his on-screen sexual politics. D'Lugo also discusses what he calls "geocultural positioning," that is, Almodovar's paradoxical ability to use his marginal positions-in terms of his class, geographical origin, and identity-to develop an expressive language that is emotionally recognizable by audiences worldwide. Two fascinating interviews with the director round out the volume. An exciting consideration of an arthouse giant, Pedro Almodovar mixes original interpretations into an analysis sure to reward film students and specialists alike.