INSTITUTO CERVANTES de Manila will be screening online for free the Spanish classic film El Verdugo (The Executioner), Luis Garcia Berlanga’s 1963 black comedy about the death penalty, on May 30 and 31.

The film is the fourth to be shown in the Spanish cultural center’s ongoing Contigo Clasico (Classics with You) program which is screening 11 classics of Spanish cinema every weekend. The program started on May 9 with Death of a Cyclist (1955) by Juan Antonio Bardem and was followed by Welcome! Mr. Marshall (1953) by Luis García Berlanga and Luis Bunuel’s Viridiana (1961).

Each film will only be available for 48 hours. All films have English subtitles.

The films were chosen because they were movies that “connected with the public of their time and that today are considered reference films of Spanish cinematography,” according to a press release.

El Verdugo revolves around a young undertaker who marries the daughter of the executioner and therefore inherits, albeit reluctantly, the job of his wife’s father.

The film is considered Mr. Berlanga’s masterpiece and was described by Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar as the “best film ever made about the death penalty.”

It caused a big international uproar when Francisco Franco’s government (having just carried out a number of public executions) unsuccessfully tried to stop the film from screening at the Venice Film Festival. The dictator failed and the film won the Critics’ Choice Award at the festival.

Mr. Berlanga’s films are known for their sense of irony and are satires of different social and political situations. Despite the political nature of his films, he had the ability to skirt around censors during the Franco dictatorship, allowing him to create films such as El Verdugo and Los Jueves, Milagro or Miracles on Thursdays (1953).

His works won awards in the most important film festivals incuding the Cannes Film Festival and Berlin Film Festival.

His last film was El Sueno de la Maestra in 2002. He died at the age of 89 in 2010.

Instituto Cervantes’ Classics with You program will continue its run through July with the films, La Vaquilla (1985) by Luis García Berlanga; The Spirit of the Beehive (1973) and The South (1983), directed by Víctor Erice; The Good Star (1997) by Ricardo Franco; The Holy Innocents by Mario Camus in 1984; Tasio (1984) by Montxo Armendáriz; and Carol’s Journey (2002) by Imanol Uribe.

Follow this link to see El Verdugo: https://cultura.cervantes.es/manila/en/El-verdugo/133261. — ZBC

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