Country: Spain
Year: 1987
Duration: 125'
Eluterio sells tinplate with his wife Chelo; sometimes, to make ends meet, he also steals a couple of chickens. He and his friends decide to rob a jewelry store but a store employee dies during the heist and the three are arrested. Unjustly condemned to death for the employee’s death, Eluterio, who is nicknamed “Lute” in prison, is pardoned and his sentence is commuted to 30 years in prison. While serving time in the Dueso penitentiary he learns to read and write. A short time later he escapes from prison, thus becoming a legendary hero in the Spain of the late Franco regime. “We based the screenplay on two books Lute wrote, but actually I made various changes as we were writing it. Lute didn’t want to make the film after he read the first draft, but we went ahead anyway. When he realized that the film would be released anyway he said that, thanks to his advice, the screenplay had been greatly improved. But we hadn’t corrected a single line!” (J. Jordá)
Biography
film director
Vicente Aranda
Vicente Aranda (Barcelona, 1926) during the early 1960s with Fata Morgana (1965) he became part of the School of Barcelona. In 1976 he directed Cambio de sexo, which marked the beginning of his collaboration with the actress Victoria Abril and introduced the themes of passion and eroticism, a constant in his most successful films: Amantes (1991), El amante bilingüe (1993), and La mirada del otro (1998). He made a name for himself with his cinematographic transpositions of Spanish novels and short stories – the two films dedicated to the bandit El Lute were great national successes – and in 2001 he inaugurated a trilogy of costume dramas, Juana la Loca (2001), Carmen (2003) and Tirante el Blanco (2006).
FILMOGRAFIA
Fata Morgana (1965), La novia ensangrentada (Un abito da sposa macchiato di sangue, 1972), Cambio de sexo (Cambio di sesso, 1977), Tiempo de silencio (Il tempo del silenzio, 1986), El Lute, camina o revienta (El Lute, o cammina o schiatta, 1987), El Lute II, mañana seré libre (1988), Amantes (Amantes - Amanti, 1991), El amante bilingüe (L’amante bilingue, 1993), La mirada del otro (Lo sguardo dell’altro, 1998), Juana la Loca (Giovanna la pazza, 2001), Carmen (Per amare Carmen, 2003), Tirante el Blanco (2006)