(From top)The film festival crowd at Nandan; Rupa Ganguly and Jeet on the dance floor; Rahul Vaidya performs at Swabhumi. Pictures by Aranya Sen.

BY DAY

Pedro Almodovar?s women have the last say in a man?s world. Be it Marina in Tie Me up! Tie Me Down! or Elena and Clara in Live Flesh, Tina in The Law of Desire or Manuela in All About My Mother. They are all strong-willed women with conviction in themselves, just like Pedro?s mother.

The 10-film retrospective on the phenomenal Spanish director, at the 11th Calcutta Film Festival, is just a glimpse into a mind that blends issues from gender to nationality.

?Pedro has always been interested in Spanish society. His films are representative of post-Franco Spain, when the country saw democracy and prosperity,? said the film-maker?s younger brother Augustin Almodovar, in town to attend the festival.

The brothers had teamed up in the Eighties, with Pedro riding the creative crest and Augustin funding the ride.

During those days, Pedro would work for a telephone company and write scripts for comics and underground journals.

After debuting with Matador in 1986, Pedro touched upon contemporary Spanish life with all its idiosyncrasies ? from football to rock music, transexuality to drug-addiction ? to create a series of thought-provoking films.

Pedro works on various plots and combines them to create an unusual dramatic effect. ?He has a theory ? that films should be better than the scripts ? and he has always stuck to it. Our shooting style is very simple. We start shooting the beginning of the story and slowly get to the end,? smiles Augustin.

?But in the beginning it was very difficult because I didn?t have any money. We made our first film with the help of friends ? Now the government is helping the Spanish film industry by giving subsidies. Around 130 films are being made in Spain a year,? adds Augustin, who rues the fact that Hollywood films comprise 80 per cent of the screenings in his country.

AT NIGHT

What: The Calcutta Film Festival party hosted by Harshvardhan and Madhu Neotia.

Where: Swabhumi on Monday night.

The crooner: Rahul Vaidya, runners-up, Indian Idol.

For a good two hours, the singer belted out some evergreen and some current Bollywood numbers. Chhoo kar mere man ko, Jaane ja, Kajra Re, Aashiq banaya...

Star power: Leading the name-game brigade was civil aviation minister Praful Patel. But all eyes were on the Tolly stars. Late into the party, Rupa Ganguly hit the dance floor with Tollywood hero Jeet, sending photographers into quite a tizzy with her Kajra Re act. Jeet, however, kept his Shubhodrishti moves to the minimum and chose to charm the star-struck audience with his smile.

Actress June, normally so keen to take to the dance floor, maintained quite a low profile. Sporting her latest hairdo, she restricted herself to smiles, conversations and light bites. Also spotted were Arjun Chakraborty with wife Nilanjana, Pallavi Chatterjee, Sayantani, Arindam Sil, Bikram Ghosh and Jaya Seal Ghosh. Big names in fashion like Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Kiran Uttam Ghosh and Sharbari Dutta also dropped in.