Pablo Berger has made three films so far. The first, Mama, was made in 1988 when he was 25 years old. Mama, which is much less well known than his later movies, is a short film, a dark comedy about a family who have survived a disaster – something like a nuclear war, although this is not made explicit – and are living in a basement. Characters include a bullying grandmother and a small boy who insists on dressing as Batman all the time.
The second film, Torremolinos 73, is a 90-minute feature film and it was with this film, released in 2003, that Berger began to be really well known both inside Spain and internationally. Torremolinos is written as well as directed by Berger and stars Javier Camara as Alfredo, a poor salesman struggling to make a living selling encyclopedias in 1970s Spain (when General Franco was still in power) and Candela Pena as his wife, Carmen. Seeking ways to make a living, the couple agree to make an ‘educational’ film about marriage for a Danish backer (the film is partly made in Denmark). Not understanding what these ‘educational’ films are really about, Alfredo and Carmen find themselves unwittingly getting into the adult entertainment industry, with Alfredo becoming a film director and Carmen an adult movie star. Then Alfredo starts to take his new craft seriously and wants to make a serious, artistic film, but his bosses have other ideas. The film was hailed as a brilliant comedy on cinema and the nature of ‘real’ or commercial art.
However, most critics and viewers agree that Berger’s masterpiece so far is Blancanieves. Released in 2012, this modern version of Snow White was Spain’s entry for the Best Foreign Film category in the 2013 Academy Awards. It didn’t win this prize, but was awarded the Special Jury Prize at the International Film Festival in San Sebastian, where its star, Macarena Garcia, also won a Best Actress Award, and has also won ten Goya awards.
The original story of Snow White was made famous by the German storytellers, the Brothers Grimm. The basic story is of a beautiful girl who escapes being killed on the orders of her jealous stepmother and hides in the forest, protected by a band of dwarfs, until her stepmother manages to track her down and trick her into eating a poisoned apple. Snow White then apparently dies, but is actually only in a trance, from which she is rescued by a prince who then marries her. This story has been retold and filmed many times, including by Walt Disney, and recent versions include Mirror Mirror and Snow White and the Huntsman. However, to many viewers, Berger’s version is the most original and exciting of all.
Blancanieves (Spanish for Snow White) is a silent film set in Spain in the 1920s. It is the story of a girl called Carmen who has lost her memory and so doesn’t know her name. She is found and rescued by a group of dwarfs who work as bullfighters, and they call her Blancanieves as they don’t know who she is. It soon turns out that ‘Snow White’ has a natural talent for bullfighting, and late they discover she is the daughter of a famous, now retired bullfighter who remarried after his wife’s death. His second wife mistreated him, hated Carmen and eventually plotted to have her killed. Carmen is still in danger if her stepmother finds out who she is, so her new career as a young bullfighter, by making her famous is putting her in danger …
You can read more about Biancanieves here.