…ropean city in Kate Beckinsale’s Underworld), but then it would cease to be The Shadow of the Wind. Barcelona matters because the novel is, in addition to every other magnificent thing about it, Zafon’s reflection on the most pivotal and divisive period of Spain’s recent history, a period every Spaniard still wrestles with: the Spanish Civil War from 1936 to 1939 and its continuing influence on Spanish society. This aspect cannot be removed, and it is questionable whether a non-Spanish director (even one as g…
