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A major exhibition devoted to Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodovar has opened in Paris, as flamboyant and eclectic as the director's films themselves.
Juxtaposing family photos, shot with Almodovar's first 8mm hand-held camera, the exhibition includes many personal objects.
From the opening section in which the walls, ceilings and floors have been painted in Almodovar's signature red, the visitor is plunged into the director's universe. There is even a reproduction of a bedroom in his home, illustrating the importance of bedroom scenes in his works.
Many of the objects exposed in "Almodovar Exhibition!", organised in collaboration with the filmmaker's production company El Deseo at the Cinematheque Francais, have been lent by the director.
But Almodovar, the director of such films as "Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!", "High Heels" and "All About My Mother", said he did not see the exhibition, which opened to the public on Wednesday, as a narcissistic exercise.
He had put himself in the place of the spectator and felt they "have right to know things that are not directly in the films," he said.
"I would not have liked it had it been a narcissistic exercise or anything like that," he told a press conference at the inauguration earlier this week.
But he admitted that touring the exhibition had been a strange experience for him.
"Imagine opening a dooring and entering a limitless place, a small city in which the streets, the buildings, everything seen through the windows is made up of images of your life", he explained.
"It's very difficult for me to enter such a place."
He argued that his personal items should not become objects of worship, because they are just everyday things, "simple notebooks that I had kept or books left on the foot from my bed."
The director also revealed that he had always had a desire to write, but found cinema was a perfect way to combine words and images.
"Out of respect to literature, I still do not dare to attempt to write a novel, I don't think I have enough talent," he said.
Almodovar's latest film "Volver" (Return) starring Penelope Cruz has still not been released in France and could make it on to the selection for this year's Cannes Film Festival, set to be announced on April 20.
"Happily the exhibition does not finish with the words 'The End' but with Volver which means that my career and life are going on," he added.
"Almodovar Exhibition! accompanied by a retrospective of the director's works runs until July 31 at the cinematheque, 51 rue de Bercy, 75012 Paris. Monday to Sunday, closed on Tuesdays. Entrance from 3 to 6 euros.
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AFPEntertainment-film-arts-France-Spain
AFP 061153 GMT 04 06
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