The Black Ball – first-look review

In the urgent heat of along-awaited embrace, Rafael (Miguel Bernardeau) turns to Sebastián (Guitarricadelafuente) and quietly whispers: ​“No one disappears completely.” The words, which turn the roles of victim and captive on their head, also epitomise the work of Spanish mavericks Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo, the duo known as Los Javis and whose art is intricately tied to the lifesaving quality of memory. This idea is never clearer than inLa Bola Negra (The Black Ball), afilm that works at once as asiren and abuoy, issuing an alert to those who so mindlessly partake in the flimsy freedoms of modernity while keeping afirm grip on an earnest sense ofhope.

Loosely adapted from the work of renowned Spanish poet and playwright Federico García Lorca – who is also briefly brought back to life on screen – this wildly ambitious period drama is split into three alternating timelines. Rafael and Sebastián both physically belong to 1937 despite craving the liberties of afuture still far ahead. The former an orphaned young soldier forced to serve under the Fascist forces during the Spanish Civil War, the latter aRepublican fighter sent by destiny to heal under his kindguard.

This fated encounter ripples through eight decades, seeping into the life of Alberto (Carlos González) in 2017. The budding playwright sees his lulling routine in Madrid sharply pierced by an unexpected call announcing his right to amysterious inheritance that will lead him to Glenn Close’s pompous historian, Isabelle, and acathartic reckoning with his past and self. Meanwhile, in 1932, an anxious Carlos (Milo Quifes) is at the mercy of aselect group of men whose initiation ceremony at the town’s exclusive casino gives the film itstitle.

LikeThe Secret Agentthe year before,La Bola Negraacutely understands that apolitical reckoning can only come from aplace of critical devotion for one’s country and people. Los Javis measure no words in condemning Spain’s affiliation to the Nationalist movements taking over Europe ahead of World War Two. That same sharp criticism is applied to the present day, with the film noting how anational sense of prudishness has forbidden Spaniards from grasping how the dichotomy between the hunger of desire and the starvation of polite society has fuelled their country’s greatest art — while also leading to apainful ostracisation of their artists.

The directing duo has long shown areverence for women, lovingly capturing their female characters as beautiful and complex pillars of this world made by them, but still perceived to belong to men. While men are the central focus ofLa Bola Negra, Los Javis remain faithful to their old allegiance by surrounding their male characters with women who act as walking reminders of their thesis. Alberto’s mother, abitter addict at first glance, unravels as the personification of their Spain – amatriarch supposed to nurture her children but far too calloused by apast she is unable to gain perspective from to reach that tender core.

Calvo and Ambrossi strike awinning blow by casting Penélope Cruz as theircupletista, the highly theatrical performers who left the realm of the underground Spanish cabarets to entertain troupes during the war. The actress arrives in the film as arocket, her textured voice thundering from within her bustier-wearing frame as amating call to rouse the sex-famished soldiers. Astarry addition to the directors’ growing roster of queer godmothers, the Almodóvar muse who has represented aSpaniard ideal of femininity since the 90s is fittingly tasked with delivering perhaps the film’s trickiest line. Coming from the lips of almost anyone else, the warning would be nauseatingly saccharine, but, enunciated by Cruz as if asommelier, it finds much-needed gravity: ​“Transvestism is the fantasy of possibility. War is its opposite.”

As its knotted ends begin to untangle with great dramatic flair,La Bola Negra pulls off afeat of alchemy: to demonstrate the wondrous non-linear approach of afilm such asCloud Atlaswhile helping exorcise the Croisette from the cursed ghost of Jacques Audiard’sEmilia Pérez.Safe from abrief wobble in tone following an electrifying opening chapter, this decades-spanning love odyssey is as impressive as it is moving, grabbing at the visceral nature of Lorca’s genre-bending work to mould its staggeringly boisterous cinematic equivalent.