Niceto Alcalá-Zamora

A Spanish documentary from Jean-Paul Le Chanois & Luis Buñuel made during the Spanish Civil War.

The Spanish journalist Manuel Chaves Nogales (1897-1944) was always there where the news broke out: in the fratricidal Spain of 1936, in Bolshevik Russia, in Fascist Italy, in Nazi Germany, in occupied Paris or in the bombed London of World War II; because his job was to walk, see and tell stories, and thus fight against tyrants, at a time when it was necessary to take sides in order not to be left alone; but he, a man of integrity to the bitter end, never did so.

Spain, April 14, 1931. The Second Republic is born. From the beginning, the writer Miguel de Unamuno is considered one of the ethical pillars of the new regime. Five years later, on December 31, 1936, a few months after the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), Unamuno dies at his home in Salamanca, capital of the rebel side, led by General Francisco Franco, and main center of dissemination of its propaganda apparatus.

A chronicle of the demonstrations and public events held on the occasion of the proclamation of the Second Spanish Republic on April 14, 1931 (Sound newsreel shot by Fox Movietone News discovered in 2009.)

A documentary that takes a broad overview of the life of the dictator, which is a review of the history of the twentieth century so far. Thus, the main events of the century are analyzed through the experience of Franco, who starred in many of them in this historic document which brings together, among others, Alfonso XIII, Mussolini, Lenin, Primo de Rivera, Azaña or Roosevelt.