During the period known in Spain as the Transition (from Dictatorship to consolidation of Democracy, 1976 to 1982), films exploiting flamenco were no longer popular with the public, perhaps because of their association with the Regime and their exploitation as popular commercial escapist entertainment. The well known exception was Carlos Saura's trilogy which introduced a new way of presenting flamenco musicals: Bood Wedding (1981), Carmen (1983) and El amor brujo (1986), with the collaboration of dancer Antonio Gadés and his dance company. Also outstanding and innovative was this singular production from Tony Gatlif, Corre, gitano (1982 Run, Gypsy) that also departed from cinema conventions but did not receive the same publicity or attention as Saura's trilogy. Gatlif is a proud gypsy, a French national born in Algiers, whose varied cinematic production has been harnessed to showing a gypsy perspective within a French cinematographic environment, dispensing with polka dotted dresses with long trains and carnations. Corre, Gitano was made in Spain with Nicolás Astariaga, and alternates the performance of traditional gypsy music and dance by the Teatro Gitano Andaluz on stage, led by its director Mario Maya and Carmen Cortés as a commentary on the narrative of a gypsy youngster on the run after being falsely accused of murder. Filmed in actual gypsy surroundings with non-professional actors, the realistic ethnographic narrative and juxtaposed artistic expression of persecution, discrimination and poverty makes of the whole a powerful emotional experience.
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