La Movida Madrileña and Post-Franco Cultural Liberation, As Seen in Chus Gutiérrez’s Film, El Calentito

Indianapolis, IN

After the death of dictator Francisco Franco in 1975, Spain entered a period of transition toward democracy. With censorship, prohibitions, and restrictions finally lifted, the Spanish people were, for the first time in more than forty years, free to express their sexuality and art. This gave rise to La Movida Madrileña, the Madrid Movement. Young people led this countercultural expression of all that had been repressed during conservative . Using Chus Gutiérrez's movie, El Calentito, as an illustration, I will enlighten an American audience about the sudden and condensed explosion of art, punk, and drugs that defined Madrid and Spain for nearly a decade, and I will explore la libertad, the freedom of expression that was the concrete manifestation of the country's newfound political freedom.