Espora
The Newszine of Spanish Science Fiction and Fantasy

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Espora #3

INDEX

A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR
 

Despite the fears that some of you may have had about Espora's continuity, I'm glad to say that... here we are again. A lot has happened in the last eight months throughout the Spanish SF field, and a lot more is to come. So please stay tuned. From now on, Espora will appear every six months; look for issue # 4 on July.

CONVENTIONS AND EXHIBITIONS
 

HispaCon 2001 (Salduba). The next Spanish Convention of Science Fiction and Fantasy (HispaCon) will take place in Zaragoza (Aragón) between the 27th and the 30th September 2001, under the name Salduba 2001. Inscription fees will range between 6.000 pesetas (37 EU, $ 32) for the full package (awards dinner, etc.) and 3.000 pesetas (18 EU, $ 16) for support. Tickets for an additional "hobbit dinner" can also be reserved. A discount of 1.000 ptas. (6 EU, $ 5) will be available in several fees for the members of any SF- or fantasy-related society who book before the 12th September 2001.

E-mail: jochu@ctv.es, salduba1@mundofree.com
Official Web Site: http://salduba2001.8k.com

1st Meeting on Fantastic Literature at the Romantic Museum in Madrid. It was held between the 29th and the 30th November.

"From cosmology to SF". Such was the title of a lecture given by Erik Stengler Larrea, astronomer, at the Villa Suso Palace of Vitoria (Basque Country) on the 28th of November.

1st Comic-Book Meeting at the University of Zaragoza. It was held between the 20th and the 25th November and included the attendance of SF author Rafael Marín.

E-mail: sdircmsi@posta.unizar.es

Science Week at the Supercomputing Centre of Catalonia. It was held between the 13th and the 21st November in Barcelona, as part of the Science Week organized by the Catalonian Foundation for Research. It included a lecture by editor Miquel Barceló.

http://www.cesca.es/esp/formacion/conferencias/2000/tardor.html#0

1st Babylon 5 Meeting. It was held in Madrid between the 17th and the 19th November by the Estrella Negra fan club. It includesd lectures, games and films.

http://www.dreamers.com/estrellanegra/jornadas

A paying meeting of SF fans, Fantaficción 2000 took place in Madrid between the 10th and the 12th November. There were several exhibitions (on costumes for SF movies, Tolkien...), three panels and make up and FX wokshops. Entrance fee was 500 ptas. (3 EU, $ 2'5).

http://www.feriadelcomic.com/fanta.htm

The French SF festival Utopia (24th to 29th October), held in Nantes, proposed French readers to discover Spanish SF. To this purpose invited a bunch of Spanish writers to try and sell their books in the neighbouring country. It included authors Juan Miguel Aguilera, Armando Boix, Rafael Marín and Rodolfo Martínez, with editor Julián Díez (Gigamesh magazine) acting as link between the organization and the Spanish party. They spoke at several panels and their presence was aknowledged by the prestigious literary suplement of Le Monde. We are pleased to say that Boix and Aguilera have signed contracts with French publishers already, and others may soon follow.

http://www.noosfere.com/icarus/hist/espagne.htm

A "International" SF Symposium was held in Huesca between the 26th and the 28th October. It was set in the first edition of the Periferias festival, an effort to bring some debate on arts and science in the region. Sadly, no efforts were made whatsoever to obtain the colaboration of SF fans or societies, the event lacked organization and attendance was very scarce.

http://www.h-al.org

3rd EspaTrek. The annual meeting of Spanish Star Trek fans was held in Málaga (southern Spain) between the 22nd and the 24th September. It included workshops, amateur theatre, short fan-made films and other activities. Steps were taken towards the consolidation of a national federation of local Star Trek clubs. The AEFCF kept a stand and sponsored a lecture on space engines in the Star Trek universe.

http://www.ccapitalia.net/ngc/areacreativa/inicial.htm

The 5th Show of Fantasy and Terror Cinema of Alcalá de Henares (Madrid) took place between the 20th and the 24th September. The films showed were both Spanish (see Essay at the end of this newsletter) and foreign, as well as a selection of short movies.

http://www.festivalcinealcala.com/5muestra/index.html

EstelCon 2000. The annual meeting of the Spanish Tolkien Society (STE) was held in Galapagar (Madrid) between the 24th and 30th July. It included lectures, panels, workshops, games, readings, drama and amateur short films. An interesting cross-over took place when members of the Babylon 5 fan club Estrella Negra organized a lecture on Tolkien's influence on SF.

E-mail: pabloruiz@gnu.org

HispaCon 2000, the annual SF Spanish Convention, was held at Gijón ("pronounced Hee-hone, the sound of a donkey braying in the distance", as the Ian Watson web site kindly suggested) between the 13th and the 16th July. It shared the organization with the now traditional Gijón Noir Week. Foreign guests included Ian Mc Donald, Lois Mc Master Bujold, David Pringle and Robert Sheckley. Tim Powers and Pat Cadigan were expected to attend, but couldn't make it in the end due to medical reasons. Among many other activities, the AEFCF offered to its members a CD-Rom with images, texts and animations from and about one of the masterpieces of Spanish SF, the Akasa-Puspa universe by Juan Miguel Aguilera and Javier Redal, which consists of two novels, two novellas and a short story. As planned, the acting Directive Commitee of the AEFCF step down and a fresh team took the reins of the Association for the next two years.

http://www.drimar.com/asturcon/

A new smial (local group) of the Spanish Tolkien Society (STE) was organized in April in Zaragoza. The event took place in the Faculty of Philosophy and Literature.

SF Meeting. One of many informal meetings this year of SF fans and would-be writers took place in Madrid between the 31st March and the 2nd April. It was sponsored by escritorescf, a mailing list which hosts a writing workshop, and the AEFCF.

Hobbyland 2000, a festival on games held in Madrid in March, included a panel on SF. http://feriadelcomic.com/juego4.htm

AWARDS
 

The Ignotus 2000 Awards, voted by the members of the AEFCF and the assistants to the HispaCon (annual SF Convention) at Gijón resulted as follow:

• Best Spanish Novel: "El abismo te devuelve la mirada", by Rodolfo Martínez (Témpore)
• Best Spanish Novella: "Este relámpago, esta locura", by Rodolfo Martínez (in UPC 1998)
• Best Spanish Short Story: "En las fraguas marcianas", by León Arsenal (in Artifex vol.1)
• Best Spanish Non-Fiction Book: "El lenguaje de los elfos", by Luis Glez. Baixauli (Minotauro)
• Best Essay: "Pasajeros a bordo del Escatón", by Stephen Baxter (in UPC 1998)
• Best Spanish Illustration: Cover of "Las estrellas mi destino" (Gigamesh), by Trazo
• Best Spanish Audio-Visual Work: "El archivo de Nessus", by Pedro Jorge
• Best Spanish Poem: "Poemario Phaedra", by Juan José Aroz
• Best Spanish Magazine: Gigamesh (Alejo Cuervo)
• Best Foreign Novel: "Por no mencionar al perro", by Connie Willis (Nova)
• Best Foreign Short Story: "Azar" (in Gigamesh) and "Directos a Portales" (in BEM), by Connie Willis

Gigamesh 2000 Awards, organized by the magazine of the same name. As usual, most categories where declared void. The winners of the rest were:

• Best SF Novel: "Cuarentena", by Greg Egan (Gigamesh)
• Best SF Anthology: "La fuente del unicornio", by Theodore Sturgeon (Playa & Janés)
• Best Fantasy Short Story: "Nieve, cristal, manzanas", by Neil Gaiman (in "Humo y espejos")
• Best Collection: Gigamesh and Minotauro
• Best Fanzine: BEM
• Best Magazine: Solaris

José Luis Rendueles, editor of the fondly remembered SF fanzine Parsifal, received the first prize in the 19th Contest of Sea Stories awarded by the town hall of Carreño (Asturias) for his short story "El bataboléu les foles".

10th Domingo Santos Short Story Contest. Awarded at the HispaCon 2000 in Gijón to "Los caminos del sueño" by Eduardo Vaquerizo (later published in Gigamesh) and "El hombrecillo de la maceta" by Alejandro Carneiro (soon to be published in Artifex).

http://www.drimar.com/asturcon/dsantos.htm

9th Pablo Rido Short Story Contest. Organized by TerMa, the weekly SF reunion of Madrid, was awarded on the 9th of July to Rafael Marín for "La sed de las panteras" (later published in Artifex). The runner-ups were "Agua mineral" (soon to appear in Framauro) and "Soñando del revés" (soon to appear in Artifex), both by Eduardo Vaquerizo, "Cualquier noche puede salir el sol" by Manuel Díez Román (later published in Artifex) and "Retrato de mujer" by María Dolores Galván.

http://www.arrakis.es/~jndro/prerido.htm

Gigamesh Essay Contest. Declared void, the jury awarded two second prizes to "Drácula: la mirada en el espejo" by Rafael Marín and "Camino del pasado" by Carlos Martínez Córdoba (both later published in Gigamesh).

El Melocotón Mecánico Short Story Award. Awarded ex-aequo to José Antonio Cotrina for "Los conejos de la guerra" and to Antonio Martín Infante for "La piel y el tiempo".

2nd Alfredo Benítez Essay Mention. Awarded at the HispaCon 2000 in Gijón to "Philip K. Dick. La realidad no es lo que parece", by Joe D'Allessandro (appeared in Mondo Brutto).

http://www.geocities.com/luisgarciaprado/abenitez/mencionab.htm

1st Dinamic Multimedia Short Story Contest. Awarded to Julio Septién for "Ojos aguamarina" (soon to appear in Artifex). Runner-ups were María del Carmen Lladó with "Maktub" and Santiago Arteaga with "Los puntos sobre las vidas".

http://www.dinamic.com

12th Alberto Magno Long Story Contest. Awarded to José Antonio Cotrina for "Mala racha" (soon to appear with other stories by Cotrina in a volume of the new Albemuth collection). A second prize was awarded to José Manuel González Rodríguez for "El desastre de Enfer".

E-mail: luxedito@ig.ehu.es

UPC Novella Contest. The best endowed Spanish prize was awarded ex-aequo to Javier Negrete for "Buscador de sombras" and José Antonio Cotrina for "Salir de fase". A special mention was given to José Luis Zárate for "Del cielo profundo y del abismo".

http://www.upc.es/op/catala/cienciaficcio/2000/2000.htm

Jaen Novel Contest (not SF). Awarded to Germán Sierra for "Automedicación", a SF-Noir novel.

PUBLICATIONS
 

BEM closes shop. The longest running fanzine of the 1990s, BEM announced through an e-mail note that its 75th issue had been the last, due to the obsolescence of its model. The editors declared that they had been musing about the closing for the last two years, and that efforts to find replacements had been unsuccessful. Subscribers will obtain a refund.

New SF collection. Equipo Sirius, a publishing house specialised in popular science books, has launched the new SF collection Tau, which wil publish novels by Spanish-speaking authors. The first book was as exception: a series of articles on SF and science by Miquel Barceló that bridged the two interests of Equipo Sirius. http://www.equiposirius.com

E-mail: jorgeruiz@wanadoo.es

A good year for León Arsenal. Arsenal, a writer previously known for his space opera short stories which appeared in fanzines throughout the first half of the 1990s, has had the historical novel "El hombre de la plata" published by Valdemar (and now in its second print) and his short stories collected in "Besos de alacrán y otros relatos" (Metrópolis Milenio).

Writer Juan Miguel Aguilera struck it lucky when its novel "La locura de Dios" was bought for publication in France by the publishing house Au Diable Vauvert.

"El anacronópete", rediscovered. This 19th century Spanish novel by Gaspar, which portrayed the first ever literary time machine (several years before Well's "Time Machine") has now been published by Círculo de Lectores (a book club). As it happens, "El anacronópete" was distributed two years ago in a diskette to the members of the AEFCF.

A new technothriller by a former minister. Manuel Pimentel, former minister for labour in the previous government, has published his first novel "Peña Laja" (Planeta). It explores the possibilities of biotechnology in the frame of a spectacular archeological discovery.

"Viaje a un planeta Wu-Wei". During the HispaCon 2000 in Gijón, the organization offered assistants with a new edition of Gabriel Bermúdez Castillo's seminal novel of the 1970s.

http://www.drimar.com/rudy/wuwei.html

Gigamesh will pay. Gigamesh's long claim to be a professional magazine seems to be taking shape as editor Julián Díez announced that they will begin paying colaborations from issue 28, not splendidly but quite nicely. Its sister magazine, Stalker (fantastic cinema) has taken the same step from issue 13.

New e-zine. Utopia is the name of a new project directed at shading light over previously unknown authors. SF content is optional. The first issue, annunced for october, is delayed.

Another e-zine. La Plaga, "a republican electronic fanzine" (sic) can be found at: http://theplague.ci-fi.com/

And yet another. Aleph, "the literary e-magazine", can be found at: http://www.aleph.imagoediciones.com/

"De Profundis" is the inspiring name of a book published by Artifex Ediciones which collects short stories by the best new authors of the 1990s, plus an essay on each one of them. It includes stories by León Arsenal, Daniel Mares, Eduardo Vaquerizo, Félix J. Palma, Carlos F. Castrosín and Armando Boix.

http://pagina.de/artifex

Armando Boix has appeared with his short story "El niño que no quería ser feliz" in an European anthology published on occasion of the French Utopia festival. The anthology will also appear in German and Italian, with a possible English edition. Authors include Andreas Esbach, Christan Grenier, Christopher Priest, Nicoletta Vallorani, Peter Schaap and Henrik Loyche.

SF writer César Mallorquí has published a new novel in the young readers collection Nómadas (Edebé).

Círculo de Lectores (a book club) has published "Nox Perpetua", by Javier Negrete. It had previously appeared in an amateur edition.

Pulp Magazine. Under this name, several issues have been published on Spanish and foreign pulp literature.

http://www.ciencia-ficcion.com/pulpmagazine

A new site for Ad Astra. The veteran electronic fanzine announced that issue 18 can be found at its new site: http://www.dreamers.com/adastra

"Rebelión en Telura", by José Antonio Suárez, previously self-published in diskette, will appear in the young readers collection Nómadas (Edebé).

Ciberpaís Mensual, a new magazine on Internet and electronics, is publishing short stories by some of the leading Spanish SF authors.

New amateur collection Albemuth. The publishers of El Melocotón Mecánico fanzine have announced this new collection that, as a novelty, will pay authors their due. The first book (which was delayed from July to December) has included the short stories that won the 2nd El Melocotón Mecánico short story contest. Three more books are announced for some time in 2001.

Bab5com. A new fanzine on Babylon 5 published by the Estrella Negra fan club.

E-mail: juanjo_cabrejas@wanadoo.es

"Gog" comic book. By SF writer Juan Miguel Aguilera and Paco Roca, it has been published by La Cúpula.

Yes: one more e-zine. Qliphoth (sic) is the name. Mithology and SF. It can be found at: http://www.geocities.com/qliphoth_zine/

Something slightly different from an e-zine... Oh, hell, who are we trying to fool? Another new e-zine, Bibliópolis can be found at: http://www.bibliopolis.org

Terminus-Trantor: the comeback. The impressive database by Juan José Parera is back in shape: http://www.ttrantor.org

OTHER ACTIVITIES
 

Singer Raphael, notorious for his theatrical demeanor on and offstage, stars in the Spanish version of the famed "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" musical.

A glosary of SF. Through the mailing list glosario@egroups.com, a group of Spanish fans are slowly putting together a list of SF and scientific words, with lenghtly explanations and references to the most popular SF series. Work began on the 12th July 1999, and to this day there are already 1.000 entries in the glosary. It ca be visited at: http://www.ciencia-ficcion.com/glosario

Design your own extraterrestrial. The TV programme "Redes" (Sundays in La 2, the second public channel) announced a contest to describe and draw a possible extraterrestrial not based on carbon or water. "Redes", directed by Eduardo Punset, has also broadcasted an special show on SF which included appearances of witer Juan Miguel Aguilera and editor Miquel Barceló.

Spanish Language Writers Forum. To get to know each other: http://www.expoescritores.com

Writer Rodolfo Martínez is in charge of the SF zone in El Foco http://www.elfoco.com/El_Foco/channel/home/1,1257,4_818,00.html?

Spanish SF series on Internet. "La cuadrilla espacial" follows the adventures of a group of space bullfighters (!) in the year 2999.

http://www.plus.es/codigo/lacuadrilla/plus/portada.asp

Homage to writer Pascual Enguidanos. The long-forgotten creator of the "Saga de los Aznar" pulp series in the 1950s was visited in Valencia last September by a bunch of fans.

ESSAY: Spanish Fantasy Cinema in the 20th Century
by Pablo Herranz

In the last two years the Spanish fantastic cinema has been the object of two homages in the 10th Annual Horror and Fantasy Film Festival of San Sebastián and in the 1st International Week of Estepona. These encounters motivated a projection of movies, panels and several books.

Even if the Spanish fantastic cinema can not be qualified as excessively original, it possesses a certain entity derived of a production that amounts to the extraordinary quantity of 330 movies. The Spanish fantastic production didn't extend in a capricious way, but rather responded in every decade to market imperatives, government rules, or box office hits emulated by other producers, fructifying in themes and recognizable styles in every concrete period.

Among the first rough beginnings, the figure of Segundo de Chomón, pioneer in the animation technique, stands out with films as "El hotel eléctrico" (The electric hotel, 1906) or "La casa de los duendes" (The house of the goblins, 1911). Chomón would end up working for George Méliès and designing the fx of the colossal "Cabiria" (1914) or "Napoleon" (1927).

The possibilities of the talking movies, that had a late installation in Spain, were convulsed by the bloody civil war (1936-39) and its consequence, the dictatorship of General Franco. During the hard postwar period, there were few fantastic films: some slight comedy -"El destino se disculpa" (The destiny begs pardon, 1944); "El Diablo toca la flauta" (The Devil plays the flute, 1953)- and most important "La torre de los siete jorobados" (The tower of the seven humpbacks, 1944), where Edgar Neville, one of the most interesting directors of the forties, adapted Emilio Carrere's novel set in Madrid, a lucky mixture of fantasy and popular folklore in a tower submerged in the bowel of the Spanish capital. From this hesitant period mention must be made of "El huesped de las tinieblas" (The guest of the darkness, 1948), oniric tale about the poet Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer, that in the XIX century wrote superb horror stories, and "Parsifal" (1951), an unusual and disappointing mixture of the germanic legends and the arturic cycle.

The sixties opened up the door to coproductions and a more cosmopolitan cinema in the dictatorial régime. At the end of the decade several avant-garde films were attributed to the cultural movement La Escuela de Barcelona; some of them related with fantasy ("Fata Morgana", "Liberxina 90", "Aoom"). Nevertheless, in an industrial level and far away from the avant garde echoes, it was "The awful Dr. Orloff" ("Gritos en la noche", 1962), that introduced the terror cinema in strict sense in this cinematography. Its director, Jesús Franco, followed the formula in "The diabolical Dr. Z" ("Miss Muerte", 1965), second part of the previous film in which he established the basis of one of the autochthonous myths, Doctor Orloff, present in five of his films. Jesús Franco, whose identical last name to that of the fateful dictator has caused jokes of all kind, would continue with an irregular career in a descending way. Director of more than 150 movies, in the decade of 1960 was fascinated by the aesthetics of the comic ("Kiss me monster"), and the erotism ("Necronomicon" aka "Succubus"), and directed some movies with the figure of Fu Manchu embodied by Christopher Lee. In the seventies he directed "Count Dracula" ("El conde Drácula", 1970) and some titles on the myths of terror, progressively mad in his anarchical amalgam of the director's constants: sex, irony and a limitless love for the popular culture. In the eighties he found refuge in erotic and pornographic cinema, which were very popular in the aftermath of censorship.

Another emblematic figure of Spanish terror was Jacinto Molina, more known as Paul Naschy. Scriptwriter and main character of "Frankenstein´s bloody terror" ("La marca del hombre lobo", 1968), directed by Enrique Egiluz, this actor introduced in this movie the werewolf Waldemar Daninsky. Naschy returned to the Universal´s monster rallies without caring that the Gothic was in frank setback: vampires and wolf men were in their films as had been in "House of Frankenstein" (1944), but their praiseworthy perseverance -that has alowed him to augment a long filmography- wasn't recouped by an imaginative realization or a solid script. His fourth wolf man interpretation, "The werewolf vs. the vampire woman" ("La noche de Walpurgis", 1970), directed by León Klimovsky, was a big box office hit that would facilitate the entrance of some film directors interested in the genre and of upstarts that rushed to the production reaching the amazing amount of 80 horror movies in only three years.

Although it was a short period, there were already some recognizable directors during this period like the mentioned León Klimovsky, Carlos Aured, Eugenio Martin and Amando de Ossorio. It was the last one who established a more outstanding trajectory: on the basis of renovating thematically the horror cinema, he looked for such themes in the popular mythology as African folklore ("Night of the sorcerers"), germanic legends ("Grasp of the Lorelei"), or the sinister figure of the templarios, his most celebrated creation, the revived knightmen as authentic living deads that sowed the panic in our time starting from "The blind dead" ("La noche del terror ciego", 1972), the first of a quartet.

During this decade, a generic star system was also settled down (Paul Naschy himself, Patty Shepard, Jack Taylor, Helga Liné, Narciso Ibáñez Menta, María Silva or Howard Vernon). As it seems, and with few excepctions, this Spanish horror put emphasis in international castings in the unequivocal search of the mimicry, of a cinema that was exportable, set generally in a no man's land (from unconcrete to sometimes neighbouring countries). To this characteristic of the economical profitable Spanish horror made in the seventies we must add others: the lack of subtlety -but for the scripts and their accelerated exhibition of relevant information, and the progressively trickier and more splatter sequences-, interpretations which generally lacked commitment (mainly the extras, some secondary ones or main actors of ephemeral memory), and above all the poor production values of these movies constrained by the low budget. However, there were some remarkable movies: "The house that screamed" ("La residencia", 1969), "Blood castle" ("Ceremonia sangrienta, 1972), "Horror Express" ("Pánico in the transiberiano, 1972), "Let sleeping corpses lie" ("No profanar el sueño de los muertos", 1974), "Island of the damned" ("¿Quién puede matar a un niño?", 1976), or the inferior but curious "Beyond the living dead" ("La orgia de los muertos", 1972)

In this listing of six movies two directors appear twice, Jorge Grau and Narciso Ibáñez Serrador. The first one, Jorge Grau, born in Barcelona, was one of members of La Escuela de Barcelona with films like the avant-garde "Acteon" (1965). Formed in Italy, he shows reflexive and rested solidity in his narration, very much in syntony with the time, and great actors direction, matter to which he dedicated a book. The Argentinian born Narciso Ibañez Serrador, son of the actor Narciso Ibáñez Menta, has been one of the main instigators of fantasy in Spain. He directed the TV series "Historias para no dormir" (Stories not to sleep), based on stories of Poe or Frederic Brown, that gained an enormous popularity in 1966-67 and that would generate a new batch in 1981-1982. Of ease and enviable verb, he introduced the films in the way of Alfred Hitchock´s presents in two cycles of fantastic movies, "Mis terrores favoritos" (My favorite terrors). His two only movies, about which we´ll speak later, are counted among the best in Spanish horror.

1975 began to evidence an exhaustion of the formule: the end of the censorship and the bloom of the erotic cinema, the push of television and of the Hollywood productions and the disappearance of the German or French capital, it took the Spanish production to a cul-de-sac. Naschy adopted director's tasks and all the specialized directors spaced their works. It merged some rough crossings with comedy -like "Brujas mágicas" (Magic witches, 1981)- and erotism -"Hot fantasies" ("Los ritos sexuales del diablo", 1980)-. It also saw the rising of Juan Piquer Simón, a director that shot in English for the international market, in the beginning more or less guided toward the adventure and fantasy, like Jules Verne´s "Where time began" ("Viaje al centro de la tierra, 1976), and after then, in syntony with the times, the cinema of psychopaths in "Pieces" ("Mil gritos tiene la noche", 1982), the dribbly murderers of "Slugs" (1987), the submarine science fiction of "The rift" ("La grieta" 1989), or the commercial use of the name of Lovecraft in the forgetable "Cthulhu Mansion" ("La mansión de Cthulhu", 1991).

The coming of democracy fomented literary adaptations, and with the arrival of the socialists to power, the administration was still more reluctant to help the so called popular cinema. Of this period "Arrebato" (Flare, 1979), experimental film and interesting reflection on the nature of the film creation, and "Anguish" ("Angustia", 1987), film that plays with the narration in several levels directed by the famous Bigas Luna, should be stood out. Other films: the expensive "Star knight" ("El caballero del dragón", 1985), failure film about an alien visitor to the Middle Ages, and "Rowing in the wind" ("Remando al viento", 1987), estheticist movie on the mythical encounter in Villa Diodati between Byron and the Shelleys, directed by Gonzalo Suárez, a moviemaker who has dedicated a good part of his filmography to fantasy -"Don Juan in Hell" ("Don Juan en los infiernos", 1991)-.

The change of the cultural policy at the end of century resulted in the appearance of a batch of beginner directors that brought renovation to the Spanish cinema. It´s worth to stand out Álex de la Iglesia, who brought some expectations with the futurist comedy "Mutant Action" ("Acción mutante, 1992) that would be fulfilled with "The day of the Beast" ("El día de la bestia", 1995). This film, important in the panorama of the moment, caused a chain reaction among the generation partners with movies of similar characteristics -"Atolladero" (1995), "The killer tongue" ("La lengua asesina", 1996), "Sólo se muere dos veces" (You only die twice)- and the return of the veteran Jesús Franco -"Killer Barbys" (1996)- and Paul Naschy -"Lycantropus: the moonlight murders" ("Licántropo", 1996). Another young value coming from short fiction, Alejandro Amenabar, that debuted with the meritorious thriller "Thesis" ("Tesis", 1994), continued with a plot with echoes of Philip K. Dick, "Open your eyes" ("Abre los ojos", 1994). In the same way that Spain produced the first European film of animation, "Garbancito de la Mancha" (Tom Thumb from La Mancha, 1945), scored a point with the first European movie animated by computer, "Megasónicos" (1997). Other recent movies are "El milagro de P. Tinto" (The miracle of P. Tinto, 1998), surrealist comedy with cartoon rhythm and extraterrestrial visitors, and "El corazón del guerrero" (The Warrior's Heart, 2000), a film on the role playing games with a parallel world taken out of heroic fantasy that proves the high technical virtuosity of the last Spanish cinema. Nowadays, the eyes are on in a movie produced by the Almodovar brothers, "The Devil´s backbone" ("El espinazo del diablo", 2001), directed by the Mexican Guillermo del Toro ("Cronos", "Mimic"), in the new film of Amenábar ("The Others", with Nicole Kidman) and in the production house Fantastic Factory from Barcelona that, directed by Brian Yuzna, wants to specialize in fantasy films of which they already have produced "Faustus" (dir: Brian Yuzna), "Arachnid" (dir: Jack Sholder), and will finance the new project of Jaume Balagueró, one of the Spanish new talents.

Eight recommended movies of the Spanish fantastic cinema

"The Awful Dr. Orloff" ("Gritos en la noche", 1962/Jesús Franco). Film shooted in black and white and highly superior to others directed by the same director ("Count Dracula", etc) that combines a detective plot, the horror melodrama and echoes of Georges Franju or the German expressionism. Played by Howard Vernon, had several sequels and an imitation, "The face of terror" ("La cara del terror", 1962). It´s easy to buy online.

"The Sweet Sound of Death" ("La llamada", 1965/Javier Setó). Surrealist approach to the topic of amour fou and life after death. An unclassifiable film, a delicate and subtle fantasy that reminds us in tone to the ghost Latin American literature without being fully successful.

"El sonido de la muerte" (The Sound of Death, 1965/José Antonio Nieves Conde).- Remarkable science fiction film in a pulp vein about a dinosaur appearing on a Greek island. Competent narration. With Ingrid Pitt. By one of the most important directors in the Spanish cinema that popularized in Spain some postulates of the Italian neorealism with their great movie "Surcos" (Furrows, 1950).

"The House that Screamed" ("La residencia", 1969/Narciso Ibáñez Serrador).- Enormous international box office hit, a movie of high budget that mixes the buried erotism of a boarding school of young ladies and the tribute to Alfred Hitchock with some camera movements and a narrative technique that leaves in evidence to many Spanish horror films.

"Let Sleeping Corpses Lie" ("No profanar el sueño de los muertos", 1974/Jorge Grau).- Only for strong stomaches, a zombies film aligned because of its explicit scenes with the philosophy of gore, inspired in "Night of the living dead" (1968). Very well made, with firm narrative pulse, it contains genuinely terrifying sequences. By the director of "Blood Castle". Avalaible on the web in DVD or VHS in English language original version.

"Island of the Damned" ("¿Quién puede matar a un niño?", 1976/ Narciso Ibáñez Serrador).- Inferior to "The House that Screamed" ("La residencia", 1969) but more original in its plot, a suffocating, almost apocalyptic vision on a couple of tourists at the mercy of the children of an island that uncannily have rebelled against the adults. Time before Stephen King´s "Children of the corn".

"The Day of the Beast" ("El día de la bestia", 1995/ Álex de la Iglesia). Three comic characters will try to stop the birth of the Antichrist in Madrid. A comedy that recovers the achievements of a genre that has had several great titles in Spain (mainly in the fifties), blended with the director's pleasure for the fantastic and for the comical.

"The Nameless" ("Los sin nombre", 1999/ Jaume Balagueró). Inspired by a novel of Ramsey Campbell, a film whose argumentational incident (the sects, disappearances of a child) is overcome by a setting and a dark atmosphere. The director is very influenced by David Cronenberg, David Lynch and J.P. Witkin.

SOURCES AND OTHER INTERESTING SITES ON SPANISH SF:

http://www.aefcf.es
http://www.drimar.com/asturcon
http://www.cienciaficcion.org
http://193.144.76.38/agasf
http://www.arrakis.es/~jndro/terma.htm
http://usuarios.intercom.es/nacpb/frames.htm
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Zone/7461/
http://www.geocities.com/javromara/
http://www.cienciaficcion.com/
http://pagina.de/artifex
http://www.pjorge.com/nessus
http://www.bemmag.com/
http://www.izar.net/~aroz/
http://www.silente.net/
http://qoweb.usc.es/cf/jcc/GalCF.html
http://www.bibliopolis.org
http://www.ttrantor.org
http://dreamers.com/estrellanegra/

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