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A SELF INTERVIEW
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A: The part that runs from when Javier goes to the
Cinematheque until he finishes telling the film to the
recumbent, remote Alicia (about ten minutes running
time) is one of my favorites.
Q: What's the reason for this "detour" from
the central story?
A: It only seems like a detour, because the nurse's
story doesn't actually stop during those seven minutes,
rather it overlaps and merges with that of Shrinking
Lover. In any case, the original reason (when I was
working on the script) was so that I could use the silent
film as a front.
Q: To hide what?
A: What is really happening in Alicia's room. I don't
want to show it to the spectator and I invented Shrinking
Lover as a kind of blindfold. In any case, the spectator
will discover what has happened at the same time as
the other characters. It's a secret which I'd like no
one to reveal.
Q: That's called manipulation.
A: It's a narrative option, and not exactly a simple
one. That's why I'm so proud of the result.
Q: In any case, it isn't the first time that your characters
explain themselves through another film. For example,
in Tacones Lejanos...
A: Yes. Victoria Abril shouted a scene from Autumn Sonata
at her mother, Marisa Paredes, in order to explain the
love and hate that she felt for her, a love and hate
so great they'd even driven her to kill. In Matador
the protagonists hurry into a cinema (she's running
away from him) where they are showing Duel In The Sun.
On the screen they can see what their own end will be.
In Carne Trémula, while Liberto Rabal and Francesca
Neri are fighting, the television is showing Buñuel's
Rehearsal For A Crime (aka The Criminal Life of Archibaldo
de la Cruz). Buñuel's film could well provide
the title for this section of Carne... And its images
anticipate two elements which will later appear in my
film, a legless man (after this scene Javier Bardem's
character ends up in a wheelchair, in The Criminal Life...
it was a dummy which had its leg removed) and the fire
which would trap Angela Molina's character when Liberto
breaks off with her (in The Criminal Life... it was
the oven in which Archibaldo de la Cruz was burning
a dummy identical to the character played by Miroslava.
By coincidence, years later, the actress really did
die in a burning car).
For me, the films I see become part of my own experiences,
and I use them as such. There's no intention of paying
homage to their directors or of imitating them. They're
elements which are absorbed into the script and become
part of it. "Telling films" is something that
has to do with my biography. And I'm not talking about
a film forum or the typical discussion about cinema
(I hate those). I remember that when I was little I
would tell films to my sisters, films that we'd seen
together. I'd get carried away by the memory and while
I was telling them I'd reinvent them. Really, I was
making my own adaptation, and my sisters preferred my
inaccurate, delirious versions to the original film.
I remember that during those hours when time slowed
down (sitting in the patio while they sewed, or gathered
around the table with the brazier underneath), they
would say: Pedro, tell us the film we saw yesterday...
Q: Can you see yourself telling films to your grandchildren?
A: I don't know, It's getting late for me to have grandchildren...
In any case, I don't think I'd do it. I don't tell films
anymore, I've lost that skill and I only talk about
them when I'm forced to do so in interviews.
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