MARRO, ALBERT

(1878-1956)

Pioneer producer, cinematographer, and writer-director Albert Marro was born in Barcelona to a wealthy family. By 1897, he owned a rudimentary theater where he showed short films (among the earliest to reach Spain) interspersed with musical and comic numbers. It was in this context that he met Segundo de Chomón, who had just returned from his first trip to France. Chomón's technical acumen and Marro's entrepreneurial skills made them a good team to record images, which they distributed and showed successfully. Together, in 1901, they set up, with the help of Luis Macaya, Macaya and Marro, one of the first Spanish production companies.

This effort characteristically floundered in a few years, and in 1907 Marro founded Hispano Films with the Baños brothers, but without Chomón (who had returned to Paris). Soon they decided to concentrate on fiction films. One of the most ambitious films of the company wasDon Juan Tenorio(1910), followed the next year byCarmen o la hija del bandido(Carmen, or the Daughter of a Bandit, 1911). Innovatively, they went beyond recording a static stage performance by introducing camera movements and choreographing movement within a shot. The company was a success, and they continued producing narrative films with a strongcostumbrismoflavor until 1918, when a fire put an end to Marro's film enterprises. Among the more remarkable films produced and directed by Marro were his adaptation of Vicente Blasco Ibáñez'sEntre naranjos(Among Orange Trees, 1914),Elva(1916),Diego Corrientes(1914), and the thriller, co-directed with José Maria Codina,Barcelona y sus misterios(Barcelona and Its Mysteries, 1916), a serial that took inspiration from Louis Feuillade'sFantomasfilms.