The openly gay star director Pedro Almodóvar (“The Room Next Door”) sees Europe as having a duty to form a shield against politicians like Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Vladimir Putin. “We are, above all as Europeans, obliged to become some kind of shield against monsters like Trump, Netanyahu, or the Russians,” the 76-year-old said at the Cannes Film Festival.
They are obligated, because we here respect international law. There is a line to all the “insanity” of Trump, he elaborated. “Europe must never submit to Trump,” said the Spanish director, who wore a pin reading “Free Palestine.” A few days earlier, the Spanish Hollywood star Javier Bardem at Cannes had criticized the “toxic masculinity” of the three rulers.
Almodóvar said it also seemed to him a “moral duty” for artists to speak out on social issues. While he condemns no one who does not speak out, silence and fear are a bad sign that democracy is crumbling.
In Cannes Almodóvar presented his film “Bitter Christmas,” which is in competition for the Palme d’Or. The tragicomedy links the story of a filmmaker in crisis with that of an advertising executive who later turns out to be a character in his screenplay. The film deliberately plays with two levels of narrative and two timelines and asks the question of how far reality may influence fiction (TheColu.mn reported).
Almodóvar is the most internationally known Spanish director. His film “All About My Mother” won an Oscar in 2000. He received another Oscar in 2003 for “Talk to Her.”
Marcy Ellerton
