by Duane Porter
“Once upon a time, somewhere on the Castilian plain, around 1940,” a truck rolls past the signpost for Hoyuelos. Excited children gather around it as it pulls to a stop. “The movie’s coming! The movie’s coming!” Film cans and a projector are unloaded and carried into the town hall. A woman blows on a small horn and announces ticket prices for a showing of Frankenstein (the 1931 film directed by James Whale) to be held at five o’clock that evening.
Inside the makeshift theater, the people gather before a big movie screen hung on the wall opposite the door. Everyone carries in their own chair, the children hurrying to place theirs closest to the screen. The lights go out and the film begins with a friendly word of caution for those of delicate sensibilities. Beware, this movie will be about man’s transgression into God’s domain, the creation of life and its inevitable death. Everyone listens intently, the children wide-eyed, one man lights a cigarette.
The screen fades to black before our story slowly cuts away to a close-up of a man inside a hooded face mask, appearing much like a monster himself. This is Fernando (Fernando Fernán Gómez) wearing protective gear tending his bees. Plaintive notes of piano and flute (score by Luis de Pablo) drift in over the buzzing of the bees. A woman’s voice is heard in voice-over and continues as the film cuts to her hands with pen and paper. This is Teresa (Teresa Gimpera) sitting in honey-colored light filtering through an octagonally-paned window (cinematography by Luis Cuadrado) writing a letter to someone she once knew. She speaks of loss and desolation and doesn’t even know if this person, a lover perhaps, is still alive. Riding a bicycle, she takes the letter to the station as a train arrives, she slips the letter into a slot on the side of a mail car and stands there watching as the train departs.
We return to the town hall as Frankenstein continues. Everyone is intently watching with anticipation and dread as the monster joins the little girl by the lake. Among the audience, we notice another little girl. She has large dark eyes and an intense expression of pained concern on her round little face. This is six-year-old Ana (Ana Torrent), daughter of Fernando and Teresa, watching her first movie. As the little girl in the movie hands the monster a flower, Ana has her first encounter with the magic of cinema, a moment of wondrous amazement that we can actually see flash across her face. The experience is overwhelming and will change how she sees everything around her, helping her to make sense of the world and its mysterious combination of horror and beauty. Troubled by what she sees on the screen, Ana turns to her sister, “Why did he kill her?” Isabel (Isabel Telleria), being a little older than Ana, assumes the role of mentor, “I’ll tell you later,” she whispers.
Later that night, as they lay in bed, Ana strikes a match and lights a candle that sits on the bedside table between a tiny ornately framed religious icon and a stuffed toy monkey. Ana asks again, “Why did he kill the little girl and why did they kill him after that?” Ready for sleep, Isabel impatiently responds, “They didn’t kill him, and he didn’t kill the girl … Everything in the movies is fake, it’s all a trick.” Starting to enjoy her assumption of authority, she continues, “Besides, I’ve seen him alive … he’s a spirit … you can talk to him whenever you want, just close your eyes and call him, ‘It’s me, Ana.’ ” This notion takes hold of Ana’s imagination, haunted by her earlier cinematic epiphany, she becomes obsessed with finding this spirit.
Victor Erice was born on June 30, 1940, in Carranza, in the north of Spain. These were the days following the Spanish Civil War and the rise to power of Francisco Franco, who was to rule Spain from 1939 until his death in 1975. Erice grew up under the pall of dictatorship. The experiences of Ana in The Spirit of the Beehive are reflective of Erice’s own childhood. With parents living as if in mourning for reasons obscure or unknown to a child, a child might be left to try to understand things on its own. The train tracks, the roaring train, the poisonous mushrooms, the guerilla soldier, the bonfire, the abandoned well. But Erice does not want his film to be read as an autobiography. He is aiming at something much more universal, the innocence of children and the importance of imagination during childhood. He does, however, recall his early experiences with cinema very much as they appear in the film, “in the midst of a bombarded reality … improvised theatres anyplace, rickety benches and slats equipped with a ramshackle projector that projected over and over again the same deteriorated film ….” Cinema became, for him, both a consolation and an aspiration.
A dedicated admirer of Ozu and Rossellini, Erice is one of the few true poets of cinema, also fascinated by painting, especially fellow Spaniards Velasquez and Zurbaran, but also the Dutch painter Vermeer, his films are preoccupied with light and darkness, time and memory, silence and ambient sound, frames within frames. The smallest detail in his mise-en-scène is often more important to him than whatever narrative there might be. Uncompromising in his aesthetic, he has only been able to complete three feature films. The Spirit of the Beehive came first, ten years later there was El Sur/The South (1983), and then ten years after that he made Dream of Light/The Quince Tree Sun (1992). The last being a feature length documentary about the painter Antonio López García and his attempt to paint a quince tree growing in his back yard. Although few in number, the quality of Erice’s work is undeniable and he is widely considered to be among Spain’s greatest filmmakers.
When it first appeared Franco was still very much in power and there are many who see veiled criticisms of his oppressive regime in Erice’s images, but much more than a critique of dictatorship, The Spirit of the Beehive is about the transformative power of childhood imagination and cinema’s capacity to grasp and enter into that imagination. Linda M. Willem (professor of Spanish at Butler University and editor of a collection of interviews with Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura) sums it all up this way, “Ana is the one unbroken spirit that exists within the metaphorical beehive of conformity and isolation in post-war Spain, and as such, she represents an element of hope for the future and an inspiration for others to dare to take chances, both personal and political.”
With her burning dark eyes and open searching intelligence, the presense of Ana Torrent is the heart of the film. In what must be considered one of the most impressive performances by a child actor, she has given us the most poignantly subtle portrayal of that time in life when the innocence of childhood gives way to a terrible awareness of one’s own mortality. We watch in rapt attention when, as Ana, she sits up in bed and takes a glass of water from the nightstand and drinks. She empties the glass and returns it to the nightstand, then crawls out of bed and walks toward the window. Moonlight streams through the window into the room creating octagonal patterns of light and darkness on the floor. A dog is barking somewhere outside and as Ana approaches the window we hear soft notes from a piano and then the slightly eerie wordless sounds of a lilting soprano. Ana opens the window and steps out onto the balcony. Remembering the words of her sister she turns her face toward the moon and summons the spirit, “It’s me, Ana. It’s me, Ana”
Now here’s one that I absolutely and completely believe should be in the top ten; like all the best movies about childhood (at least so far as I’m concerned) it centers on the way that children create myths, from imaginary friends to new religions, that govern their lives. Hm. Drop Dead Fred (1991) is another movie that might have been considered in this context.
Whatever, Duane: Thanks for a splendid account — and some superb screengrabs. Your efforts are much appreciated here.
Thanks, John. Yes, Spirit of the Beehive may be the finest depiction of childhood imagination ever put on film. Some others may come to mind but it’s hard to compete with this one.
The Spirit of the Beehive is about the transformative power of childhood imagination and cinema’s capacity to grasp and enter into that imagination. Linda M. Willem
Torrent is the heart of the film. In what must be considered one of the most impressive performances by a child actor, she has given us the most poignantly subtle portrayal of that time in life when the innocence of childhood gives way to a terrible awareness of one’s own mortality. We watch in rapt attention when, as Ana, she sit
One of the masterpieces of the cinema, one of the finest films to ever come out of Spain, and of course when we speak of childhood films this one rates supreme. Duane you have pained an exceedingly brilliant and passionate work of scholarship, and have ensured the readers this vital film is in very good hands. Yes I do know Erice is a disciple of Ozu and Rosselini, and the cinema in general, as can be seen with the central theme connected to James Whale. He is a cinematic poet, an avid art aficionado, and one who incorporates this appreciation as you say into his framing. Though as you note his short filmography contains some other excellent films, I’d rate the 2006 short LA MORTE ROUGE right behind SPIRIT. You have brought a new level of appreciation to this masterpiece my friend!
*claps hands*
Thanks, Sam. It’s been a pleasure to participate in this latest Wonders countdown. Beehive is one of my most loved films and was my choice for top spot. It’s placement in the top ten is gratifying.
One of my favorite all time films and so beautiful in so many ways. I remember my first viewing and the way I was completely transfixed. It was recommended to me by a dear friend back in College. Every time I think of this film I think of her. The visuals in this film really speak to me. Great stuff Duane!
Thanks, Jon. It’s a beautiful film, indeed. Once seen, it will never leave you.
One of the most essential films in this entire countdown. Haunting and filled with the dread and longing of childhood. Terrific review, Duane Porter.
Thanks, Tim. Yes, we’re in complete agreement about the importance of this film in a countdown such as this. Ana’s struggle to make sense of the things that she will never fully understand is haunting, indeed.
I remember being absolutely blown away by this when I first saw it at the cinema in the 1970s (actually before I’d seen ‘Frankenstein’, so this was the first time I saw the amazing scene of the monster and the little girl.) Wonderful review, Duane.
Thank you, Judy. Yes, Spirit of the Beehive was a standout film in a decade full of standout films, simply unforgettable. I can’t think of a better way to be introduced to Whale’s Frankenstein than through Ana’s eyes, that is, if you had missed seeing it as a child yourself.
Excellent review.It is very difficult to make movies with children as the protagonists.