Gutiérrez Aragón, Manuel

b. 1942, Torrelavega (Santander)

   Filmmaker

   After graduating from the Escuela Oficial de Cinematografía (Official Film School) in 1970 Gutiérrez Aragon collaborated on the scripts of films such as Borau's Furtivos (Poachers) (1975), Camino's Las largas vacaciones de 1936 (The Long Holidays of "36) (1975) and García Sánchez's Las truchas (The Trout) (1978) as well as launching a successful career as director with Habla, mudita (Speak, Mute Girl) in 1973 which won him a Critics" Prize at Berlin. His next film, Camada negra (Black Brood) (1977) produced and co-scripted by Borau, for which he was awarded the Director's Prize at Berlin in 1979, proved to be highly controversial. Made less than two years after Franco's death it was a study of a fascist terrorist family, ending with the brutal murder of his girlfriend by the 15-year-old son. Three "bewildering symbol-laden films", Sonámbulos (Sleepwalkers) (1977), El corazón del bosque (The Heart of the Forest) (1978) and Maravillas (Wonders) (1980), were followed by two films which appealed to a much wider audience and sold well abroad. Demonios en el jardín (Demons in the Garden) (1982), in which three women, his mother, his aunt and his grandmother, fight for the affection of a young illegitimate boy, has been described as a film of great beauty and sensitivity. Claimed to be in part autobiographical, it is set in the wooded northern region of Spain which features in several of his films. La mitad del cielo (Half of Heaven) (1986), a "touching, lyrical and beautiful" film about a country girl who buys and runs a restaurant in Madrid with the help of a rich benefactor, won him a Golden Shell at the San Sebastián Film Festival.

   In the 1990s Gutiérrez Aragon worked for television, winning an award at Cannes in 1992 for his production of El Quijote. His film El rey del río (The King of the River) was the sole Spanish entry in the 1995 Berlin Film Festival, and was one of the ten selected for showing in Los Angeles in February 1996 in an exhibition of Recent Spanish Cinema.

   See also: film and cinema

   EAMONN RODGERS