FILM : This Time, Saura Keeps It Light, With ‘Ay, Carmela!’

Carlos Saura, probably Spain’s most admired living director, has made a career out of identifying “the three big monsters,” as he calls them, that plague his country: the church, the military and the lack of sexual freedom.

Through such movies as “The Garden of Delights,” “La Gaza” and “Peppermint Frappe,” Saura has confirmed his reputation as a stalwart leftist, a filmmaker who stresses personal freedom and has stood up to fascism, even when Franco was running things.

In his latest movie, “Ay, Carmela!” (screening Friday as part of Golden West College’s Foreign Film Series), Saura opts for a smile over a grimace, grinning down many of the usual demons with a style so wry and muted that the politics just glides by. The setting may be as huge as the Spanish Civil War, but the story’s scale is as small as a funny anecdote.

The year is 1938, and the “Tip-Top Variety” troupe featuring Carmela (Carmen Maura) and Paulino (Andres Pajares) is performing near the front for the Spanish Republican army. The act is crude and rude (Paulino does a loudly cheered encore of body noises), but the troupe provides some relief for the partisans fighting the Germans, Italians and Franco’s loyalists.

Almost by accident, the popular Carmela and Paulino become unlikely symbols of the resistance. Everything’s going well enough until they’re captured by the fascists, who have their own plans for “Tip-Top Variety.”

Carmela and Paulino are expected to perform for an enemy audience of Spanish and Italian troops. Paulino is ready to change sides to save himself, but Carmela isn’t so sure. Slowly but obviously (and amusingly) Carmela’s idealist’s soul is revealed.

Since Carmela’s conscience and jubilation over life are at the movie’s core, Saura depends on Maura, the star of many Pedro Almodovar comedies, to carry “Ay, Carmela!” Maura obliges easily; she’s equally comfortable with the film’s more submerged ironies and its wide-eyed humor.

Paulino isn’t developed nearly as much, but Pajares still creates a memorable character from the skeleton provided. Most of the time, Pajares is setting up Maura, just reacting to her, but he does it with wit. As critics have pointed out, Pajares brings the droll inventiveness of a silent-film star to this slight but touching tragicomedy.

What: Carlos Saura’s “Ay, Carmela!”

When: Friday, Oct. 18, at 7:30 p.m.

Where: Golden West College’s Forum II theater, 15744 Golden West St., Huntington Beach.

Whereabouts: San Diego (405) Freeway to Golden West Street and head west. Go south on McFadden Avenue to Gothard Street and head west. Enter the Center Street parking lot next to the campus.

Wherewithal: $3 and $3.50.

Where to Call: (714) 891-3991.