New Spanish Drama Explores Queer History Across Decades in Netflix Release

The sweeping epic film 'La Bola Negra' explores the lives of gay men in Spain across different eras of political upheaval and suppression. Directed by Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo, known collectively as Los Javis, the movie moves back and forth between the years 1932, 1937, and 2017. The production was partly inspired by pages from an unfinished play by Spanish playwright Federico García Lorca and Alberto Conejero's 'La piedra oscura'. Netflix gave the film an unprecedented 47-day window in theaters before its streaming release in December.

Storylines

The 1937 storyline opens with a brutal attack in a small village where aircraft fire on residents welcoming Italian troops during the Spanish Civil War. A lone trumpet player named Sebastián escapes by joining the Nationalist army, where he is assigned to guard a Republican leftist captive named Rafael Rodríguez Rapún. Sebastián soon finds himself drawn to Rafael, who shares stories about his life in the arts. A second storyline set in 1932 follows a young man named Carlos facing rejection from a local social club, where members cast votes using black and white balls. The third storyline centers on Alberto, an openly gay historian in 2017 who receives unexpected news about an inheritance from a maternal grandfather, uncovering complicated generational trauma involving his mother, Teresa. The film also features a musical performance and monologue from Penélope Cruz and a cameo by Glenn Close.

Context

'La Bola Negra' runs for 157 minutes and has received an R rating from the Motion Picture Association for violence, bloody images, graphic nudity, sexual content, and language. The film connects themes of silence, shame, and fascism across multiple generations of Spanish history. It serves as a major introduction for U.S. audiences to the work of directors Calvo and Ambrossi.