‘Emilia’: Tribute to one of the great writers of Spanish literature

She already said it herself Emilia Pardo Bazán, main figure of Spanish naturalism and considered a forerunner of women’s rights and feminism: “Woe to mankind if history were reduced to the oppression of the weak by the strong, to the triumph of violence!”. After exploring the life of Benito Pérez Galdós in ‘El siglo de Galdós’, which commemorated the centenary of his death; Miguel Ángel Calvo Buttini now dares to portray who his great love and literary counterpart was, the author of ‘Los pazos de Ulloa’ and considered one of the main female faces of Spanish literature. She does it with ‘Emilia’screened in the DOC Spain section of 67 Seminci of Valladolid.

Buttini once again demonstrates his ability to narrate the life of an essential literary figure. However, in the case of Pardo Bazán, the Navarrese chooses to combine the conventional style of a statement documentary with the monologues of the play written by Noelia Adánez and Anna R. Costa, also recovering Pilar Gómez in the role of the famous author. The mixture between the two formats is what causes ‘Emilia’ is a better artistic exercise than ‘El siglo de Galdós’, being an example of renewal and approaching the revolutionary spirit of the professor and also essayist.

And that’s what It allows us to discover the bolder side of a woman who doesn’t mince words and who has been educated to look at the opposite sex in the same way. Pardo Bazán was a pioneer and the documentary reflects that spirit very well, claiming her as a forerunner of feminism and highlighting her uncomfortable position on issues related to politics, coming from an aristocracy and a conservative background.

Furthermore, the film reveals how this difficult insertion into a political discourse has made her a female and feminist literary figure with little claim by the political class, despite her revolutionary character and which Already at the end of the 19th century he published the book of stories ‘El encaje roto’, in which he captured the sexist violence to that suffered by women in their homes or on the street. The of him are phrases like “women’s education cannot be called such education, but dressage, since obedience, passivity and submission are finally proposed” or “all women conceive ideas, but not all conceive children”in which she already embodied the idea of ​​motherhood as an act of free choice.

A tribute to one of the great women of Spanish literature

That reactionary spirit, Buttini and the work of Adánez and Costa know how to convey it and manage to make it a tribute to the height of the work of an exceptional woman, who has broken many glass ceilings, because She was the first female member of the Ateneo of Madrid, where she joined on February 9, 1905. And much of this is due to the introduction of the fictitious part, with Pilar Gómez disguised as Pardo Bazán. Her interpretation of the naturalist author is fascinating and it is her work that makes you feel that you are faced with an innovative documentary proposal with a cinematic approach.

‘Emilia’ follows the spirit of another recent documentary that honored the life and work of another pioneer, María Lejárragathat Laura Hojman portrayed so well in ‘A las mujeres de España’, which recalls the didactic and informative nature of the documentary, without forgetting its artistic and cinematic nature. Buttini has also achieved a style reminiscent of Arantxa Aguirre and his magnificent works such as “Love and Death”, in which he approached the work of Enrique Granados; or ‘Zurbarán and his twelve sons’, in which he explored the life of the famous Spanish Baroque painter. Decidedly, one of the most important non-fiction films of this 2022there could be no better tribute to an author like Pardo Bazán.

Note: 8

The best: The scenes with Pilar Gómez, the ideal Pardo Bazán.

Worse: Makes you want to see more of the author’s life.