The cinematic image of José Antonio Primo de Rivera: somewhere between a leader and a saint

The Franco regime carefully cultivated the image of José Antonio Primo de Rivera in a way which differed significantly from the approach adopted by other European dictatorships. Whereas other countries used the media, specifically cinema, to highlight the charisma of their current leader, the Franco regime concentrated on building up a posthumous image of Primo de Rivera as a fallen hero. For decades to come, Spaniards would be subjected to a funerary cult. There were clearly some advantages to this tactic of diverting attention away from the actual leader, not least for Franco himself. The persona reconstructed around Primo de Rivera underwent a morbid transformation from politician to prophet, from agitator to martyr and saint, conceptually embalmed as a votive deity. There is much more that could be said on the contrast between this essential undercurrent of National Catholicism in Spanish fascism and its distinction from more innovative and radical varieties of European fascism, such as the fundamentally pagan ideology of German Nazism