When in 2008 Javier Bardem collected the Oscar for best supporting actor for No country for old men He dedicated it to his mother, Pilar, an example of commitment and tenacity, of an actress who suffered under the dictatorship and never remained silent, who fought for the rights of her sector and led demonstrations for all social causes. “Mom, this is for you, for grandparents Rafael and Matilde. It is for the comedians of Spain who brought dignity and pride to our profession. This is for Spain,” he said at the moment when Hollywood was elevating him and in his language, Spanish.
Bardem is better defined by that word, comedian, than by the word actor. Because he has an insatiable search for work, but also coherence and commitment when choosing roles and when raising his voice from the privileged pulpit that he has, and there is no doubt about it, one of the best actors working in the world. He, like his mother, has been at the head of demonstrations, has produced documentaries and has raised his voice when he has been needed.
That is why the Donostia Award that was given to him last year by the San Sebastian Film Festival and which he received a year later for the 2023 actors’ strike, feels fair and necessary. Not only for his acting, but for what lies behind this comedian who transforms his body until he disappears in each of the roles he plays. Bardem could have been a boxed-in actor due to his marked features, due to his masculinity that Bigas Luna was able to see so well in his first roles as Ham, Ham o Golden eggs.
However, he quickly showed that it was plasticine capable of turning those Iberian males into the weakness of the junkie of Days are numbered, for which he won the Silver Shell in San Sebastian, or to the fragility and tenderness of Reinaldo Arenas who won the Volpi Cup in Venice – a prize he would win again with Deep sea– and her first Oscar nomination.
Against self-censorship
This commitment was evident in all his responses at the press conference for the Donostia Award, which he will collect tonight. In fact, he said that the way things are, the world is not in “a spirit to celebrate anything.” Bardem has never been silent, and although he has said that he has sometimes thought about whether it would not be more convenient to do so, he believes that “if one censors oneself, there is no possibility of change, because then those who think that the frontal attack on those who denounce the abuses of human or social rights is legitimate win.”
He brought it up to date, to what is happening in Palestine, and he made his opinion clear: “What is happening in Gaza is unacceptable, it is terrible, it is dehumanizing. I believe that the Government of Israel is the most radical government in its history and is committing crimes against humanity and against international rights. The atrocious and reprehensible attacks by Hamas on October 7 do not justify the global punishment, the massive punishment that the Palestinian population is suffering. The impunity that the Government of Israel enjoys in its actions in Gaza has to change.”
That is why he asked countries like Germany and the United States to change their international support in the face of this violation of human rights. “We cannot be passive in the face of this. What I say will not change anything, but society is beginning to change. The right to criticize a government has nothing to do with the false accusation of anti-Semitism. Or criticizing Hamas is not Islamophobia. We are all victims of what is happening. We have a moral and ethical obligation to denounce what we consider unjust. We also have to recognize that the current Israeli government, which is far right, does not represent the Jewish community or even Israeli society. We are heading towards a terrible place that I think scares us and we need a social voice that gives voice to Israel’s impunity,” he added.
The current far-right Israeli government does not represent the Jewish community or even Israeli society. We are heading towards a terrible place that I think scares us and we need a social voice to speak out against Israel’s impunity.
Javier Bardem
— Actor and Donostia Award
This commitment was the focus of much of his answers, because he believes that “there is no other option.” “It is not a will or a desire to do something. It is an impossibility for it to be the opposite within each person’s circumstances. Mine is the circumstance of a fortunate person blessed by life and incomparable to other atrocities out there. This is about learning by looking at those who really produce changes. And choosing those people who produce progress in human rights, civil rights, social rights. And also knowing who are those who delay or nullify them. There we all go learning and knowing that we have to choose a side. Unfortunately there are sides. I wish the world were a place without so much competition and without so much rivalry, but there are things that are unacceptable and that cannot be ignored. Yes, one must have the motivation to point out those things that one considers unjust.”
At the press conference, when mentioning this activism, it was impossible not to remember his mother, Pilar Bardem, from whom he learned everything. “It all has to do with education, and in this case with my mother, and it continued with my profession, which is also a profession very, very aware of the human needs of all of us. I don’t know an actor or actress who is not a highly sensitive and empathetic person. And this is a beautiful thing about our profession,” he added.
Unfortunately, there are sides. I wish the world were a place without so much competition and rivalry, but there are things that are unacceptable and that cannot be ignored. Yes, you have to have the motivation to point out those things that you consider unfair.
Javier Bardem
— Actor and Donostia Award
That is why he believes that one of his greatest blessings is: “Having been born and raised in the womb of my mother, because the male side has not been so present.” “Today, three years after her death, I realize the validity of her existence in my personal history and in my children. That has to do with ethics, dignity, humility and empathy. I am not a saint, there are days when I am an idiot, but I do not want to lose sight of the fact that I belong to a society, and that individually we can do little, but as a group there are changes that can occur and I have seen that in my home,” he said.
She recalled an anecdote about her mother that her brother always tells her, and tonight he will be one of those who will give her the award: “At home we had almost nothing. My mother was a separated woman at a time when divorce was not allowed. She had three children, and she was almost called a prostitute and persecuted by a terrible right wing in the streets. She worked non-stop to give us pork chops and pasta with tomato. That was on the days when we were lucky. But if they knocked on the door and it was people who were collecting for the Sahrawi women, she gave them half. That is not taught from a didactic point of view, but from action, because that is what represents us as humans. What we do, not what we say.”
He also took advantage of the press conference to announce that he will once again be filming a movie in Spanish. It will be the new film by Rodrigo Sorogoyen and alongside Victoria Luengo. They will play a father and daughter in a story written by the director together with his usual scriptwriter Isabel Peña and which will be filmed starting in January in Fuerteventura.
Source: www.eldiario.es
