Songs for After a War
(Canciones para Después de una Guerra)
Basilio Martín Patino / Spain / 1971 / 96 min
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A documentary about popular songs in the first 15 years of the Franco dictatorship (1939-1953), Songs for After a War montages archival images to the rhythms of popular music of the time, featuring such emblematic figures of popular culture as singer Estrellita Castro and bullfighter Manolete, along with scenes of hunger and Falangist meetings, and forms a subtle mosaic of postwar Spain. Despite its lack of direct political criticism, the film was deemed unacceptable for public viewing.
About the Director
Basilio Martín Patino studied philosophy and arts but also attended to a School of Cinema. His first film was Nine letters to Bertha (Nueve cartas a Berta,1967), one of the most important films of the New Spanish Cinema. The film Songs for a post war (Canciones para despues de una Guerra, 1971) which reconstructs Spain from 1939 until 1953 forbidden visual and musical documents until the death of Franco. He’s done excellent works on the fake documentary category, developing the possibilities of the medium. He has proven to have a particular vision of Spain in each of his 21 films to date, covering over 40 years. His last film, Free is How I Love You (Libre te Quiero, 2012) is his newest film. Patino’s interest on ancient and modern film technologies has got him involved on a huge collection of magic lanterns and zootropes.