El amor brujo (1986)

Director:

Carlos Saura

Writers:

Gregorio Martínez Sierra (libretto)
Carlos Saura (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

23 December 1986 (USA)

Genre:

Music | Drama

Plot:

In a Gypsy village, the fathers of Candela and José promise their children to each other. Years later...

Plot Keywords:

Ghost | Dance | Gypsy | Knife | Fighting

Awards:

3 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Antonio Gades	...	Carmelo
Cristina Hoyos	...	Candela
Laura del Sol	...	Lucía
Juan Antonio Jiménez	...	José
Emma Penella	...	Tía Rosario
La Polaca	...	Pastora
Gómez de Jerez	...	El Lobo / Cantaores
Enrique Ortega	...	Padre de José
Diego Pantoja	...	Padre de Candela
Giovana	...	Rocío
Maria Campano		(as Mari Campano)
Candy Román	...	Chulo
Enrique Pantoja
Manolo Sevilla	...	Cantaores
Antonio Solera	...	Guitarrista

Also Known As:

A Love Bewitched
Carlos Saura Dance Trilogy, Part 3: El Amor Brujo (USA) (DVD box title)
Love, the Magician

Runtime:

100 min | Argentina:108 min

Country:

Spain

Language:

Spanish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby | 4-Track Stereo

Certification:

Australia:G | Spain:T | USA:PG | West Germany:6 | Argentina:Atp | Finland:S

Company:

Emiliano Piedra

Quotes:

Tía Rosario: [Carmelo and Candela have come to Aunt Rosario so as to get her advice on how to deal with the ghost of José who keeps tormenting Candela] I was expecting you two. There's only one thing to keep the dead from returning: FIRE!
[She points her finger forcefully at a blazing bonfire]

Movie Connections:

Version of El amor brujo (1992) (TV)

Soundtrack:

El Amor Brujo

Setting the record straight

Formalismo, that school of Hispanic literature that emphasizes form as function, or form over function, has little to do with Saura's EL AMOR BRUJO. This is Saura's final work in his flamenco trilogy that began with BODAS de SANGRE and includes CARMEN. As with those two films, Saura bases this cinematic ballet on a previous work, Manuel de Falla's EL AMOR BRUJO. The other two films in the trilogy were based on Lorca's BODAS de SANGRE and Merimee's and Bizet's novel and opera, CARMEN. These three classical works are not examples of formalismo. Rather, they are prime examples of both the realistic and impressionistic schools of literature which under the creative mastery of Saura become sensual re-creations of love, passion, betrayal, and death. The love stories here supercede form and attain a thematic content worthy of the great literary works they portray. The starkness of the set is for symbolic purposes and not for form nor for function. The dilapidated, dusty set represents the emptiness of the soul that has lost great love, or has been deceived by a bewitching love. The set takes on color when Candela dances the Fire Dance, and again at the end when Lucia sacrifices herself to be the eternal lover of the bewitching ghost of Jose, thus setting Candela free from his cursed memory. Saura never lets us forget the tension between reality and fiction as the dawn rises on a new day over a theatrical set free of obsessions with death and love that bewitches the lover.