Appropriation and reappropriation of the female voice in the “españolada”: the case of El Gato Montés

Abstract

Spanish first female director's first feature film, El Gato Montés (Rosario Pi, 1935), partakes of the tradition of the so-called “españolada”, which at the time used to adapt theatre plays onto screen. Based upon Maestro Penella´s homonymous zarzuela, Pi, who was also the scriptwriter, recuperated the character of the gypsy Soleá and, with very little changes in the plot, managed to re-write some aspects that had to do with the relationship between women and men, their own bodies and decisions. This article establishes a comparison between the two texts and uses film and gender theory in order to analyse the mechanisms of appropriation, writing and re-writing of the female voice.