Close Up

15 February 2020: Hortensia/Beancé

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Hortensia/Beancé
Jose Antonio Maenza, 1969/2020, 105 min, Silent

Pere Portabella, producer of Hortensia/Beancé, said of the film's director, José Antonio Maenza: “He was consumed by his own voracity, was against his time”' Maenza made three works in his short, intense career characterised by the concerns of revolution, sexuality, Marxism, Situationism, ritual and collage; the last of which, Hortensia/Beancé is an exercise in filmmaking as political and revolutionary act, a chaotic and explosive social experiment expressed on film but left unfinished at the time of Maenza's death (in late 1979 he was found seriously wounded near his home with signs of having been beaten and died a few days later – the circumstances of his death remain unclear). 

The screening copy which premieres at Close-Up and closes the London-wide Pere Portabella film survey has been specially edited for the occasion by Pere Portabella and Marcelo Expósito, with a total running time of 105 minutes. We are delighted to announce the attendance of Pere Portabella at this event.


Part of the Liberated Film Club's retrospective on Pere Portabella

"A Worm’s Tail View is Often the True One: Films by Pere Portabella", curated and produced by the Liberated Film Club, is the most complete, ambitious and creative survey of the radical Catalan filmmaker Portabella's work ever to have taken place. Close-Up is proud to act as headquarters and locus for this London-wide survey, taking place over four months at venues including ICA, Whitechapel Gallery, Cafe Oto and the University of Cambridge.

With thanks to the kind support of Institut Ramon Llull and Films 59.

More info: purge.xxx/portabella


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