Pedro Almodovar

Born: 24th September 1951
Where: Ciudad Real, Spain

Colourful, overtly sexual and showing respect to none (let along the Catholic church) Almodovar's career is a direct riposte to the grim austerity of dictator General Franco's rule.

Revered as the best Spanish director since Luise Bunuel, he is seen as representative of the new, vibrant Spain.

Career highlights include Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!, All About My Mother and the Oscar-winning Talk To Her.

Growing up in a poor village near Toledo, the young Almodovar had any faith crushed out of him by strict Fransiscan monks and replaced it by obsessive cinema-going.

At sixteen he settled in Madrid, alone, without family or money, but with a very specific aim: to study and make films.

Despite failing to get into the official film school (Franco has closed it) he flourished in the relatively relaxed atmosphere of the capital.

He had many short-lived jobs but couldn't save enough money to buy his first Super-8 camera until he got a 'serious' job in the National Telephone Company of Spain.

Almodovar stayed there for twelve years as administrative assistant, making cine-films on the side and viewed the job as his 'true education'.

He spent his time writing, acting with theatre group Los Goliardos and making movies on Super-8mm and also collaborated with underground magazines and even joined a parody punk-rock group, Almodovar and Mcnamara.

He was fortunate that the opening of his first film in commercial cinemas coincided with the birth of Spanish democracy.

After a year and a half of difficult shooting on 16mm, "Pepi, Luci, Bom & Other Girls From the Heap" had its premiere in 1980.

He shot to more mainstream fame in Britain and around the world with his hilarious 1987 hit Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown.

After numerous awards in New York, Venice and London, and an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Film, Pedro became an international art-house darling.

His work became even better known thanks to the performances he teased out of an attractive, young Spanish actor named Antonio Banderas, who appeared in several of Almodovar's films throughout the 1980s.

With 1999's All About My Mother major recognition as a world class director and writer had finally come. Almodovar won the Best Foreign Film Oscar, the Golden Globe, the César, European Film Awards, 2 BAFTAs and 52 other awards.

The 2003 Academy Awards brought further recognition with Talk To Her, his bizarre tale of two men in love with women in comas.

However, it also raised allegations of misogyny - charges which had been levelled at his earlier Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down!.

In 2004, he made the semi-autobiographical Bad Education with Gael Garcia Bernal and Fele Martinez.