Catalan Cinema: The Barcelona Film School and the New Avant-Garde

“This volume on the emergence of the influential Barcelona School and its impact on the broader filmmaking culture in Catalonia offers a unique insight into the work of filmmakers whose impact has not always been recognised. A series of insightful essays recentres figures such as Pere Portabella and Joaquim Jordà, and provides bold treatments of the crop of Catalan filmmakers who have gone on to pick up their mantle: José Luis Guerín, Albert Serra, Isaki Lacuesta, and Jaime Rosales. If you want to understand where the women filmmakers who are currently shaking world cinema, including Carla Simón, Carla Subirana, and Neus Ballús, are coming from, this volume is a great place to start. An important contribution to Catalan cinema studies with an influence that goes beyond this vibrant national film culture to wider areas of avant-garde filmmaking.” Maria M. Delgado, Professor and Vice Principal of Research and Knowledge Exchange, The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London

“This is an extraordinary and careful collection of essays on two essential moments in the history of Catalan cinema (the 1960s–1970s and the present), which focuses on what these two periods have in common and what sets them apart. The book establishes a bridge between the political and aesthetic experimental cinematic images that the most significant directors of these two periods have produced. The editors have provided their readership with fascinating and challenging theoretical and analytical perspectives on the best of Catalan cinema, and the book as a whole provides an excellent genealogy that will assist scholars and experts in delving deeper into the complexities of the Catalan film tradition. This is a remarkable co-edited work.” Cristina Moreiras-Menor, Kathleen M. Canning Collegiate Professor of Spanish and Women’s and Gender Studies, University of Michigan Ann Arbor