Eloy de la Iglesia

Eloy de la Iglesia (1 January 1944 – 23 March 2006) was a Spanish screenwriter and film director.

De la Iglesia was an outspoken gay and socialist filmmaker who is relatively unknown outside Spain despite a prolific and successful career in his native country. He is best remembered for having portrayed urban marginality and the world of drugs and juvenile delinquency, with many of his films dealing with the theme of homosexuality. Part of his work is closely related to the phenomenon popularly known in Spain as quinqui films, to which he contributed several works. De la Iglesia took risks in his films that captured the struggles of the underclass, portraying the everyday, unidealized lives of powerless characters portrayed genuinely with flaws and vices. They are an example of commitment to the immediate reality, going against the conformist outlook of most movies of its time. Beyond their debatable aesthetic merits, his film served as a document of the Spanish marginality of the late seventies and early eighties, and they have the stamp of his strong personality.

Early life and films Born in Zarauz, Guipúzcoa into a wealthy Basque family, he grew up in Madrid. His desire to follow a career in filmmaking initially was thwarted. He attended courses at the prestigious Parisian Institut des hautes études cinématographiques, but he could not enter Spain's national film school because he wasn't yet 21, the minimum age required for admission. Instead, he began to study philosophy and literature at the Complutense University of Madrid, but he abandoned it to direct children's theater. By age 20, he had written and directed many works for television sharpening his narrative skills. He established himself as a writer of children's television programs for Radiotelevisíon Española in Barcelona.

De la Iglesia made his debut as film director when he was age 22 with Fantasia 3 (Fantasy 3, 1966), adapting three children's stories: The Maid of the Sea, The three hairs from the devil and The Wizard of Oz. While doing mandatory military service, he wrote the script of his second film, Algo Amargo en la Boca (Something Bitter Tasting, 1968).

The dismantling of the Francoist censorship allowed De la Iglesia to increase sexually charged tones in his works. This approach became apparent in his films: Juego de amor prohibido (Games of Forbidden Love, 1975) and La otra alcoba (The Other Bedroom, 1976).

Last years Like many of the young protagonists of his films, De la Iglesia became addicted to drugs such as heroin, and he stopped making films for 15 years. Claiming that his addiction to cinema was stronger than his drug problems, De la Iglesia eventually kicked his habit and resumed his career making Los novios bulgaros (The Bulgarian Lovers, 2003), a film based on the novel of the same title written by Eduardo Mendicutti.

Stricken with kidney cancer, he died on 23 March 2006, age 62, after surgery to remove a malignant tumor. He was cremated at Cementerio de la Almudena.

Filmography as director