Madrid, Spain
Mission Title: Re-Movida - Reliving the Post-Franco Movida
Mission By: Dan Coppock, Inderdeep Singh
Mission Finished on Date: 23-06-2008
SCRIPT
- Visit Madrid and explore its night life starting from Puerta del Sol.
- Interview Ouka Leele about the Movida and what survives and what might be reviving about the Movida.
- Start drinking in the city center and socialize.
- Join someone going to the Malasaña (the countercultural/hipster hood) or Chueca (the gay district) quarters, two of the liveliest neighborhoods. Record people and atmosphere, and drink. You don't want to be the only sober person.
- Talk to people and go to one of the secret after hour clubs opening from 6am to 9am. They're not legal, so try and find them out by socializing.
- Ask people about the differences between the first Movida and the re
- movida nowadays. Which places died? Which areas flourished? Is the mentality the same?
TRAVEL BAG
What are the new reasons and places of La Movida Madrileña?
It's pretty hard to picture your parents partying hard and coming back home shitfaced when daylight is kicking in, but, just so you know, the Spanish inherit their lust for nightlife from mom and dad just along with a penchant for Gazpacho and Jamon. As soon as dictator Francisco Franco kicked the bucket, the rest of the country woke up and never went to sleep again. The so-called Movida was not just a relieving party habit, but a social movement that shook Spain not only in its punk clubs and dance floors, but down to its very core. From the end of the Franco regime to the late 80s, a celebratory freedom prevailed from teenage punk rockers and rollicking drag-queens to the mayor. Madrid and its Puerta del Sol were the core of it.
Madrid's mayor Enrique Tierno Galvan was one of the key official figures in the city's opening to the movida, and he also wrote a book titled something like “the fear of reason” about marginal youth cultures he was sociologically interested in. Later mayors apparently wished for a more reasonable behavior, which is the reason they tried so hard to limit the nighttime noise and have the clubs and discos close earlier. Although people would rather call it re-movida these days, the Madrid night life still embodies the sexual liberty depicted in Almodovar's movies and young street traditions like the botellon.
