La Bola Negra
“La Bola Negra’s craft and archival ambition make it a landmark of queer cinema.”
Title: La Bola Negra (2026)
Directors: Javier Calvo 👨🏼🇪🇸🌈 and Javier Ambrossi 👨🏼🇪🇸🌈
Writers: Javier Calvo 👨🏼🇪🇸🌈, Javier Ambrossi 👨🏼🇪🇸🌈, and Alberto Conejero 👨🏼🇪🇸🌈
Reviewed by Jose Solís 👨🏽🇭🇳🌈
Technical: 5/5
Los Javis, the Spanish writing and directing duo of Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, won a shared Best Director prize at Cannes for La Bola Negra. It’s well deserved—their latest work is a gorgeous, larger-than-life melodrama about three gay men whose lives are tied together by Federico García Lorca’s (1898–1936) unfinished play of the same name. In 1932, Carlos (Milo Quifes) is blackballed from his father’s social club over rumors that he’s gay. In 1937, Franco’s army conscripts Sebastián (Guitarricadelafuente), who falls for a leftist prisoner (and Lorca’s ex-lover) Rafael Rodríguez Rapún (Miguel Bernardeau). In 2017, Alberto (Carlos González), a historian, inherits something from the grandfather he never knew.
Each era takes on the style of its literary source. The 1932 section is all Lorca, pairing the brutal naturalism of Yerma with a poetic twist out of The Public. The 1937 section turns into a theatrical fable built from Alberto Conejero’s play La piedra oscura, and the 2017 scenes take on a procedural urgency. The filmmakers merge the three eras into a modulated drama, veering from the sublime to the ridiculous without apology (watch out for the Titanic references).
The cinematography nods to Spanish painters Goya and Sorolla, while menacing portraits hover like ghosts over the production design. A heavy score with grieving brass creates an incredible moment when Sebastián blows his sadness into a trumpet, and the notes reverberate across all three timelines. Guitarricadelafuente and Bernardeau give hypnotic performances, though the women, especially Penélope Cruz as a wartime entertainer, steal the film.
Gender: 3.5/5
Does it pass the Bechdel Test? NOPE
Women in La Bola Negra exist in relation to men, but Los Javis give them each history and agency. Cruz’s Nené Romero is inspired by real-life cupletistas, including Olga Ramos, Raquel Meller, and La Chelito. She makes her living by entertaining men and turns to sex work for a few extra pesetas. Yet Nené uses her stage numbers, and a conversation with a male character, to speak about the women the war killed or left behind. Alberto’s mother, Teresa (Lola Dueñas), initially looks like the typical “bad mom” who drinks and uses drugs while she neglects her grown son until we learn why she’s worked so hard to keep the past at arm’s length.
Meanwhile, Isabelle Durand (Glenn Close) is a Lorca scholar inspired by the Irish Hispanist Ian Gibson. By casting a woman in the role, Los Javis challenge Hispanic literary studies, which has long been dominated by men. Isabelle is also one of the few women who talks with another woman on screen—a literature discussion moderator played by the trans writer Alana S. Portero (author of the novel La mala costumbre)—though they talk about Lorca.
Race: 3/5
For a film that follows Spanish soldiers and Spanish men in the years surrounding the Civil War, it makes sense that the main cast is white. But the film has a handful of moments that focus on people of color.
In 1932, a group of Roma singers performs flamenco. During a brief scene in 1937, Muslim soldiers—most likely Moroccan—pray in uniform, which serves as a pointed reminder that the Nationalists sent Arabs to the front “as shock troops” because they were considered more expendable than white Spaniards.
In 2017, Salvadoran American comedian Julio Torres plays Juan Pablo, Alberto’s partner, whose conversations with Alberto about love and romance are lovely even though the script gives Torres little to do. A Black caregiver in the same timeline rings true to the many immigrants of color who come to Spain and work as home health aides. These brief but essential moments point to Spain’s complicated relationship with colonialism and racism.
Bonus for LGBTQ: +1.00
La Bola Negra offers one of the most nuanced portraits of queer men in cinema, making room for a range of personalities and motivations. Los Javis film their desire with care, letting much of it live in gazes and omitted words. The duo has spent their careers chronicling this topic, from the lesbian longing of La llamada (2017) to the subversive trans protagonist of Veneno, the 2020 miniseries that so many watched during the pandemic. Here, Los Javis act as queer archivists of modern Spain, drawing a line from the unknown fallen heroes of Lorca’s time to a direct mention of the legendary Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar, whose company, El Deseo, co-produced this film.
Although we never see him engaging in sexual acts, Carlos’ 1932 scenes with a male friend carry an eroticism that’s more tender than carnal. Within this timeline, we hear further mentions of children and young men killed because others presumed they were gay. In 1937, the film extends its sympathy to Sebastián, a repressed man on the fascist side of the Spanish Civil War who finds himself falling for an enemy soldier. Through flashbacks, we also meet Lorca (Alberto Cortés), who lives in his sexuality with an ease the other men can only dream of. In this chapter, we also see Nené sing “Las tardes del Ritz,” a song made famous by the legendary drag performer Edmond de Bries, who disappeared during the Civil War. “Ritz” was composed by Álvaro Retana, who was twice imprisoned for his homoerotic works. The more you dig into the film, the more layers of Spanish queer history you’ll find.
In 2017, Alberto lives openly with his partner Juan Pablo, whose circle of trans and nonbinary friends, played by Spanish influencers and artists, gives this timeline its widest range of queer identities. Yenesi Suárez, a trans artist, plays Pedro’s (José Manuel Illana) assistant, Goyita. One year later, the far-right party Vox, which has voted to decriminalize conversion therapy and against trans rights, wins its first seats in the Andalusian parliament. The party has continued gaining popularity since, making Alberto’s freedom feel especially fraught.
Bonus for Body Diversity: +0.75
Alberto is a fat man whose sexual desire is explored openly—a luxury that’s usually reserved for thinner or muscled gay characters.
Bonus for Age: +0.75
Los Javis take their time revealing Pedro’s full history and give him a romantic life of his own, exploring desire in old age, which few movies seem interested in. Close, 79 at the time of the film’s release, has a prominent supporting role as a famous Hispanist.
Bonus for Disability: +0.50
Pedro lives with a tracheostomy and uses it competently, modulating his voice and choosing when he wants to speak.
Bonus for Religion: +0.25
The brief scene of Muslim soldiers praying in uniform treats their faith with respect.
Mediaversity Grade: A 4.92/5
Los Javis give queer men across a century of Spanish history the kind of grand, sweeping drama that movies usually reserve for straight romances like Doctor Zhivago (1965) and Gone with the Wind (1939). They then borrow the postmodern twist of The Hours (2002), braiding three eras together.
Only Lorca and Rapún are drawn directly from real life, but you leave the theater convinced that every one of these people once lived—that you could bump into Alberto on your way out or find Sebastián’s name in an old village registry somewhere. Women and characters of color stay on the margins, but the film’s craft and archival ambition make it a landmark of queer cinema.
Like La Bola Negra? Try these other sweeping stories with queer leads.
All of Us Strangers (2023)
I Carry You With Me (2020)
Moonlight (2016)