The guest director has curated a line-up of classics “because in some way, albeit tangentially, they have a relationship with my present.”

In addition to the previously announced screening of Almodovar’s 1987 drama Law Of Desire, the filmmaker has chosen Georges Franju’s 1960 mystery Eyes Without A Face, Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1970 crime thriller Le Cercle Rouge, Edmund Goulding’s 1947 noir Nightmare Alley and Robert Siodmak’s 1946 crime thriller The Killers.

Extensive notes by Almodovar related to his selections will appear in the official festival programme. The filmmaker said: “Law Of Desire is a fundamental title in my career. Even though we made it on a very modest budget, I don’t think I’d change a single shot, and not because it’s perfect but because I recognise myself in all of them.”

He continued: “It’s true that my palette has darkened and, in the case of the latest film, the humour has almost disappeared. Fortunately I’ve changed sufficiently so that no one can accuse me of repeating myself, but I’m still the same. Law Of Desire shows that.”

Almodovar will take part in an on-stage interview on Nov 7 with Antonio Banderas, his lead in Law Of Desire and The Skin I Live In.

AFI FEST will run from Nov 3-10 in Hollywood

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