Victor Erice’s 1973 poetical allegory of the impact of the Spanish Civil War was widely acclaimed at the time of its release and has since been justly recognized as a masterpiece of Spanish cinema. The Spirit of the Beehive tells the story of a family living in rural Andalucia in 1940 (a year after the end of the Civil War), focusing primarily upon the two young daughters, Ana and Isabel. Following the village screening of James Whale’s Frankenstein, older, mischievous Isabel tells curious Ana that Frankenstein’s monster is a spirit living in a nearby deserted hut. This sparks in seven-year-old Ana’s mind a childish fascination with the monster that results in her “adoption” of an army deserter.
The seemingly simple plot is massively enriched by the fairytale-like rendering that privileges the child’s vision of the world as a mysterious, enigmatic, and potentially threatening place. However, in this it parallels the film at the center of its narrative and shows beauty and horror to be integral rather than binary components.
A mushroom-hunt in a sun-drenched forest is set to a jovial flute-tune but soon turns into an educational treatise on the potential treachery of mushrooms; children fascinated by a bonfire jump through the flames; the beehives of the title produce rich golden honey but are a ruthless dark mass with a futile existence; the initial excitement of a listening to the track for an approaching steam-train turns into nervous worry for the girls’ safety as the huge mass plows past, dwarfing the two curious figures.
This is also written into the delicate cinematography. Luis Cuadrado’s camera finds patterns in everything it points at, and the girls are shown either in wide shots, amidst barren landscapes that emphasize their fragility, or in close ups that are endlessly fascinated by their childish response to the world. Ultimately, it is Cuadrado’s brown and green dream-like rendering of these childhood landscapes that gives Spirit of the Beehive its evocative power.
To this end, Spirit of the Beehive is perhaps best summed up by a moment that comes in the middle of the film: a girl reads a strangely dichotomous passage aloud to her equally young classmates, “I only feel thirst, a thirst for I know not what. Rivers of life, where have you gone? Air, I need air. What do you see in the darkness that makes you silently tremble? I have the eyes of a blind man who stares at the sun’s face.”
In the midst of the destruction and futility of war, Erice’s film makes a resounding call for a return to engaging with the mysteries of existence, as seen in Ana’s abiding curiosity and her closing call to her spirit-friend. After experiencing the shock of her monster’s killing, she stands at the window and repeats her sister’s lesson about spirits: “if you’re his friend, you can talk to him whenever you like. Close your eyes and call to him.”
— Fran F.
Directed by: Víctor Erice
Arts & Faith Lists:
2011 Top 100 — #93