La Bola Negra: Guitarricadelafuente – Photo; Carla Oset/Netflix
The eras-spanning Spanish epic La Bola Negra unfolds in an intricate pattern of plot and atmosphere summoned by filmmakers Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi (Los Javis). The duo, who also teamed to create HBO Max’s fierce trans-themed mini-series Veneno, layer the film with three interconnected plot lines: a modern-day generational mystery based in Madrid, a steamy gay romance between soldiers on opposite sides of the Spanish Civil War, and the scorching melodrama of a gay son of 1930s Granada society being blackballed from an exclusive club casino. Hence, la bola negra.
Through it all, one message that emerges especially clearly is that it’s better to be remembered as a homosexual than a fascist. Many present-day power brokers would be wise to keep that in mind.
To be or not to be, a homosexual or a fascist, are questions that hover over Sebastián, a generally courageous young Spaniard portrayed with striking sensitivity by the Spanish musician known as Guitarricadelafuente.
Sebastián is a bugler in the village band of a town in Northern Spain, seen welcoming Mussolini’s approaching forces as saviors in 1937. The town pays for that mistake with a bloody massacre. Los Javis stage the sequence with raw suspense, a big-time sense of scope, and a brutal attention to the details of a farm village being stormed by machine-gun firepower.
Yet, Sebastián and the camera slip elegantly through cinematographer Gris Jordana’s painterly compositions. Even depicting a deadly siege, the film never abandons its unerring taste for beauty, be it compositional or corporeal, or both. Sebastián escapes his town’s fate climbing up a muscular statue of Saint Sebastian.
In another plot thread, set in 1932, dapper rich boy Carlos (Milo Quifes) cruises the streets of Granada past a lusty line of sailors basking in the sun, like a scene by Tom of Finland. In fact, the filmmakers — who co-wrote with Alberto Conejero, based on Conejero’s play La Piedra oscura (The Dark Stone) — list the work of gay Greek painter Yannis Tsarouchis among the film’s many fine visual influences.
La Bola Negra: Penélope Cruz – Photo: Carla Oset/Netflix
The movie is beautifully, unapologetically gay in its gaze and texture. When Sebastián, who has to join General Franco’s Nationalist Army to survive, falls for the seriously wounded but still handsome enemy soldier Rafael (Miguel Bernardeau), bells start ringing in his heart and on the soundtrack. The score erupts in a tangle of horns shouting Sebastián’s quiet desire.
The film’s third thread likewise concerns a young gay Spaniard, awkward writer Alberto (Carlos González), brought into the story by a cryptic inheritance from his recently deceased grandfather. While texting and face-timing with his boyfriend Juan Pablo (Julio Torres, playing it low-key) back in Madrid, Alberto hits the road to unlock the mystery left for him to solve.
We can, of course, be assured the solution will circle back to connect with Rafael and Sebastián, Carlos and his bright-eyed bestie Enrique (Hugo Welzel), and real-life gay writer Federico García Lorca (Alberto Cortés), who was assassinated by Franco’s fascists — though he was still able to leave pages of his boldly gay-themed play La Bola Negra.
Lorca never completed the play, or if he did, only a handful of pages survived, inspiring Los Javis to create this film, itself a bold anti-fascist statement, though not without its flaws.
The movie loses its stride following the modern-day mystery, detouring into a well-meaning but hammy interlude with Glenn Close as Lorca scholar Dr. Isabelle Durand. She helps Alberto piece together literary and familial history that he might have tracked down otherwise.
She serves a greater purpose in the narrative at least than saloon singer Nené, portrayed by Penélope Cruz, exuding megawatts of charisma in the Dietrich-like role of a woman surviving the war by her wits. She comes in, lights up the screen, and leaves, essentially just a feather-in-the-cap cameo for Los Javis, flaunting one of post-Franco Spain’s biggest movie stars.
It’s a worthwhile flex, made richer by Cruz’s soulfulness, and the cheeky words of wisdom Nené shares with Sebastián before she exits the film. Whether he decides to be or not to be a homosexual or fascist, he’ll always remember her saying: “The heart of a faggot is an oceanful of secrets.”
★★★★☆
La Bola Negra is rated R and now playing in the D.C. area at the AMC Georgetown and Angelika Mosaic (in 35mm), expanding Nov. 6 to Bethesda Row, AMC Hoffman, and AFI Silver. Streaming Dec. 2 on Netflix. Visit fandango.com.
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