El Consul de Sodoma
Directed by Sigfrid Monleón
Spain, 2009, 35mm, 113 min
NORTH AMERICAN PREMIERE
Sunday, April 25
Regal 17 8:30 PM
SPOTLIGHT SCREENING
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXlknsa-6KE[/ame]
Set in the 1960’s between Barcelona and Manila, El Consul of Sodoma is a well- crafted and beautifully acted biopic that explores the rich and fascinating life of poet Jaime Gil De Biedma.
The Gil De Biedma’s are a powerful aristocratic family. Don Luis, Jaime’s father, owns and operates the Phillipine Tobacco Company where Jaime works as one of its directors and likely successor to the corporate reigns. During the day he maintains the facade of bourgeoisie businessman but at night he takes to the streets in the seedier parts of Manila in search of lustful encounters with other men. His homosexuality is an open secret that will cost him many things, but it is his association with socialist idealists disenchanted with the Franco regime, that make Jaime a person of interest to the police and cause both him and his family a great deal of trouble.
Navigating the journey of his life, filmmaker Sigfrid Monleón follows the author’s never dull existence with great detail and reverence for historical accuracy. As we learn, there was a great deal of romantic entanglements throughout Jaime’s life, each leaving a lasting impression on the soul of this complex intellectual. Their is Johnny an erotic dancer in Manila, Juan Marse a promising young novelist, Luis a social climber with lofty ambitions, Toni a young Filipino photographer, Bel the only woman he ever loved, and a young actor with whom he carried out his last days.
Jaime’s was a life of excess, pain, and turmoil that were intertwined with eroticism, passionate love affairs, high society life, and friendship with fascinating figures, Harlem Renaissance poet James Baldwin among them. Yet for all his talents, Jaime did not receive popular acclaim until nearly the end of his life when a recital of his poetry was organized by friends who knew of his impending death.
More than just a biography of an important Spanish queer literary figure, El Consul de Sodoma is an inspired cinematic work and a fascinating depiction of the changing society of 1960’s and 70’s Spain. In Spanish with English subtitles.
- Kareem Tabsch
