RIP Mario Camus

 

Film director Mario Camus dies

Pledge Times

September 18, 2021

The filmmaker of ‘Los santos inocentes’ died yesterday at his home in El Sardinero where he spent his last years. Although he tried several times, his desire to continue making films failed to translate on the screen. ‘El prado de las estrellas’ from 2007, shot in his land, signed a filmography that began in the sixties with ‘Los Farsantes’ and ‘Young Sánchez’.

A journey of artisan and professional, of talent and passion since, together with Carlos Saura and Daniel Sueiro, he wrote the story that gave rise to ‘Los golfos’, a film that participated in Cannes in 1959 and is considered the inaugural torch of the New Spanish Cinema. Involuntary protagonist of institutional events, he declared himself estranged from the Academy, distanced from a system that seems to reward failure, that prevents veterans from making films, that supports the “nonsense” of dubbing and that is defenseless against “abuse” of the best.

He never hid his discontent with the system and his skepticism, or his anger at politicians who often boast about not going to the movies. Annoyed by indifference, silence or oblivion, including the one that hampered his project for a new film, he maintained his criticism of all governments that “overprotect” American cinema instead of Spanish.

He mixed affections, uncertainties and an uncomplacent look that seeks the man. In more than thirty creations he intertwined a cinema close to feelings, framed today, a reflection of the time in which we live. Always with the aim of communicating a compelling, moving and credible story. His frustrated project ‘Histories of the Bay’ could be the testamentary link between Santander and the filmmaker.

From the beginning he achieved a relevant professional status within the film industry and embarked on a career with a wide filmography practically without comparison with other members of his generation. His own stories, commissions, literary adaptations, very personal stories make up his directorial itinerary. But Camus traces a parallel creative trajectory no less important and intense: the creation of original scripts, the writing of adapted scripts, the direction of television series, the making of television documentaries and the dubbing of films. His career, coherent and clear, with shootings with a great economy of means, between professionalism and craftsmanship, supported by very loyal names and teams, oscillates among internationally recognized works, initialed with awards at festivals, from ‘La colmena’ to ‘Shadows in a battle’, with very personal works, although they did not reach such notoriety, in the case of ‘Young Sánchez’, ‘With the sunny wind’ and ‘The color of the clouds’.

In his professional work, marked by agile and solvent filming, commercial commissions outside the world of the filmmaker succeed and alternate, such as ‘When you are not’ or ‘At sunset’ or ‘that woman’ and commissioned productions but assumed as their own as ‘The legend of Mayor Zalamea’.

CAMUS, Mario (Mario Camus García) [4/20/1935, Santander, Cantabria, Spain – 917/2021, Santander, Cantabria, Spain] – director, writer.

Weeping for a Bandit – 1964 [writer]

The Return of El Coyote – 1968 [director, writer]

Trinity Sees Red -1970 [director, writer]