This article was published on September 21, 1996. Below we reproduce in full the interview that film director Carlos Saura gave to 'La Vanguardia' on the occasion of the premiere of 'Taxi'.
Diego Munoz | San Sebastián [Special envoy]
Carlos Saura will premiere Taxi on October 4th. This new foray into realism -dirty realism, we could say- by this emblematic director of Spanish cinema was presented yesterday in the official competition of the 44th San Sebastián International Film Festival.
With Taxi, Saura returns to everyday life and leaves behind -for the moment- his forays into musical cinema with Hispanic roots, with titles as celebrated as Sevillanas or Flamenco. Works, it must be said, that for some malicious people were placed in the "folkloric" part of the author, intended for an audience of tourists, not very worthy of an author who moved the world, and especially Spain, with such notable films like La caza, Ana y los lobos or Quick, quick.
With Taxi he recovers that breath of a chronicler of a Spanish reality, as he did at the time with Los golfos (1959) and other titles. But now, he looks to the nineties and, perhaps, beyond. That is why it can be said that Saura leaves music and dance and, paradoxically, begins to dance with the ugliest: that scourge in the form of violence that can corrode a society that believed itself safe, and that day by day He sees how, if he gets lost, he can gain ground that seemed already fully conquered by other values.
Taxi is starred by the debutant -impressive, by the way- Catalan actress, Ingrid Rubio, Carlos Fuentes, a recovered for the cinema Agata Lys and, among others, the most effective here than ever Eusebio Lázaro; The film tells the story of how a group of Madrid taxi drivers organize themselves to, night after night, "cleanse" the city of heroin addicts, transsexuals, blacks or Arabs.
Throughout Europe there is a rise in xenophobia and neo-Nazism or, more simply, neo-fascism. For Carlos Saura, as he stated in the interview he had with La Vanguardia: "Spain is becoming more fascist, more intolerant every day."
-After thirty films behind him, more than three decades as a filmmaker and creator of films as emblematic as La caza we can, paraphrasing it, now affirm that with Taxi Carlos Saura is launching himself on the hunt for neo-fascism in Spain...
-Man! It would be an exaggeration, something excessive that the reading was limited to that; Among other things, because I'm not going to hunt anyone, not even the current fascists or neo-Nazis, who obviously don't like me at all. But I am an absolutely peaceful being, dedicated only to making movies. And, precisely, what attracted me to this story -written by Santiago Tabernero and who offered it to me to direct it- was how it talked about the great issues that are shaking the world right now: racism, the rise of paramilitary groups, the neo-Nazis, etc., but not speaking in terms of great theoretical formulations but through the history of the concrete, of a family and a group of taxi drivers in present-day Spain.
-And did you have any special reason for placing this group of violent fascists in the taxi drivers' union?
-No not at all. It could have been any other collective in present-day Spain where, I really liked Santiago Tabernero's script, every day fascism is growing more. Every day I see that there are more fascists, more violence and intolerance towards foreigners who come from poorer countries to look for work here. All you have to do is read the newspapers and watch the news, since cases like the one told in the film occur continuously in our cities and in those of our European environment.
What happens, and I also want to make this clear, is that one thing is the xenophobic or directly fascist attitudes or behaviors that many may, or may, have "by lip service", that is, in the language we use, in our conversations, and another much more worrying and intolerable: the use of organized violence against those who are not like us.
-But, going back to the subject of the taxi drivers, aren't you worried about some kind of corporate reaction? Are you going to get in a taxi without worry?
-I have discussed this issue a lot with the scriptwriter, and the "guilty" of placing the action between this guild are both of us. But, I insist, I hope you understand that this is fiction, not a documentary film. Although, truth be told, there are days I don't sleep thinking about when I should take a taxi.
-Do you not mind showing up in San Sebastián as if you were a beginner?
-The truth is that if. But it has been a thing of the producers -new and young: Javier Castro and Concha Díez-, and I am very disciplined with these things. I would have preferred to be out of the competition and not have to pass the revalidation of competing in a festival that, whatever is said, always produces a certain fear.
-Why have you chosen not only young actors like Carlos Fuentes, but also a newcomer, Ingrid Rubio, for the main role of "Taxi"?
-I've been thinking about it a lot. I saw a lot of twenty-year-old girls, until I did a test with her and, despite the fact that it was also adding another risk to a film that was already risky in itself, I was fascinated with Ingrid. I have a passion for actors, I love working with them and, on this occasion, I believe that the public will not be disappointed in the work that she does in the film.
-What projects do you have?
-A most sabbatical year, because I enjoy working. Next month I start shooting another film, Pajarico, this time with my script, and in which I will tell a story that is somewhat more detached from reality.
And as soon as I finish it, I'll go to Buenos Aires to shoot a new musical, which I love. This time it will be with Julio Bocca and it will be called Tango.
