Girasoles y mariposas. Apuntes sobre represión franquista en el cine de José Luis Cuerda

Abstract

The Francoist repression (either during the previous months of the outbreak of the Civil War as during the years that follow it) is reflected in two of the most outstanding films of José Luis Cuerda: La lengua de las mariposas (The butterflies tongue, 1999) y Los girasoles ciegos (The blind sunflowers, 2008). Both films set their plots in Galician lands and are inspired in literary works such as: Manuel Rivas’ stories and the homonymous novel of Alberto Méndez. In the construction of a story the knowledge of the events goes from the oral tradition to any other kind of basis such as the literary or the cinematographic one. It is also decisive to know the characteristics of the social and political context in which those editorial and cinematographic products emerge. This communication studies the way the literary storylines of Rivas and Mendez are transferred into the cinematographic universe of Cuerda, taking special attention to its clues and referents. To reflect on the above-mentioned works it is, from our point of view, a necessary exercise either to know how History is rewritten as to be able to establish a critic view over the narration and over our past.