Pedro Almodóvar considered President Donald Trump “a catastrophe” and “the biggest error of our time” while accepting an illustrious prize on Monday in New York.

The Spanish director and screenwriter made the burning comments in the film of the annual Lincoln Center gala, where he received the Chaplin prize for professional achievements in the film industry.

“I doubted whether it was appropriate to come to a country governed by a narcissistic authority, which does not respect human rights,” Almodóvar told the starry crowd, which included the legendary dancer, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and the pop singer Lipa. “Trump and his friends, millionaires and oligarchs, cannot convince us that the reality we are seeing with our own eyes is the opposite of what we are living, no matter how much the words can twist, claiming that they mean the opposite of what they do. Immigrants are not criminals. It was Russia that invaded Ukraine.”

In another part of his speech, the two -time Oscar winner compared his childhood in Spain under the dictator Francisco Franco with the experiences of current Americans under Trump.

Pedro Almodóvar accepted a film in the Chaplin del Lincoln Center award, honoring his many achievements in the film industry, Monday in New York.
Pedro Almodóvar accepted a film in the Chaplin del Lincoln Center award, honoring his many achievements in the film industry, Monday in New York.

Michael Loccisano through Getty Images

Going directly to Trump, he said: “You will go down in history as the greatest error of our time. Your ingenuity is only comparable to your violence. It will go down in history as one of the greatest damage to humanity … you will go to history as a catastrophe.”

(Look at Almodóvar’s speech in its entirety here).

The filmmaker made the comments after a series of new surveys have found that Trump’s popularity collapsed among American voters. Among the most convicted was a Washington survey after the ABC-PSOS news in which only 39% of respondents said they approve the way in which the president is handling his work.

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Almodóvar jumped to fame in Spain in the early 1980s. Its international progress occurred in 1988 with the dark comedy “Women on the Verge of a Nervous Gateown”, starring Antonio Banderas. He is widely known among the modern public for his collaborations with Banderas and Penelope Cruz, while his recent successes include “Julieta” of 2016 and “The Room Next Door” last year, starring Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton.

In addition to Almodóvar, the recent winners of the Chaplin award include Jeff Bridges, Viola Davis and Spike Lee.