The Black Ball (film)
2026 film by Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi
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The Black Ball (Spanish: La bola negra) is a 2026 drama film directed by Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi, from a screenplay they co-wrote with Alberto Conejero. A queer epic inspired by the unfinished work of the same name by Federico García Lorca and Conejero's play La piedra oscura, its ensemble cast is led by Guitarricadelafuente, Miguel Bernardeau, Carlos González, Milo Quifes, Lola Dueñas, Penélope Cruz, and Glenn Close.[2][3]
- Javier Ambrossi
- Javier Calvo
- Alberto Conejero
- La piedra oscura
by Alberto Conejero
| The Black Ball | |
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Spanish teaser poster | |
| Spanish | La bola negra |
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| Cinematography | Gris Jordana |
| Edited by | Alberto Gutiérrez |
| Music by | Raül Refree |
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Running time | 159 minutes[1] |
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| Language | Spanish |
| Budget | €15 million |
The film had its world premiere in the main competition of the 79th Cannes Film Festival on 21 May 2026, earning Calvo and Ambrossi the Best Director Award. It is scheduled to be released theatrically in Spain on 25 September 2026 by Elastica and in France on 16 December 2026 by Le Pacte.
Plot
Cast
- Guitarricadelafuente as Sebastián[2]
- Carlos González as Alberto[2]
- Miguel Bernardeau as Rafael[2][6]
- Milo Quifes as Carlos[2]
- Lola Dueñas as Teresa[2]
- Penélope Cruz as Nené[2]
- Glenn Close as Isabelle[2]
- Antonio de la Torre[7]
- Natalia de Molina[7]
- Albert Pla[7]
- Yenesi Suárez[8]
- Lorenzo Zurzolo[7]
- Daniel Ibáñez[7]
- Julio Torres as Juan Pablo[9]
- Mona Martínez[8]
- Nuria Mencía[8]
- Hugo Welzel[8]
- María Morales[8]
- Alberto Cortés as Federico García Lorca[6]
Production
Development
The plot is inspired by La bola negra, an unfinished novel of Federico García Lorca, who wrote four pages of the work before being murdered in 1936, with the title ('the black ball') alluding to the form of rejection to a young gay man when attempting to join a social club in Granada.[5] It is also inspired by the play La piedra oscura by Alberto Conejero.[5] Los Javis declined to confirm whether García Lorca would appear as a character in the film.[5]
Main cast members Guitarricadelafuente (in his acting debut),[10] Carlos González, Miguel Bernardeau, Lola Dueñas, and Penélope Cruz were announced by Los Javis during the 2025 Cannes Film Festival.[4] The Black Ball is a Movistar Plus+ and Suma Content Films co-production with El Deseo and Le Pacte,[11][12] and it had the participation of Atresmedia.[13] Other cast members such as Milo Quifes (in his acting debut),[14] Lorenzo Zurzolo, Albert Pla, Yenesi Suárez, Mona Martínez, Hugo Welzel, María Morales, Daniel Ibáñez and Nuria Mencía were announced while shooting was taking place.[15]
Filming
On 26 August 2025, local media reported the beginning of filming in the abandoned village of Castil de Carrias, halfway between Belorado and Briviesca.[16] Shooting also took place in Comillas, Cantabria (where a man working as an extra fell down some stairs on set and eventually died),[17][18] Granada (Iglesia de Santa Ana, Carmen de los Mártires, Albaicín), and Sigüenza.[19][20] The production boasted a budget of around €15 million.[21]
Spanish cinematographer Gris Jordana shot the film in 35mm film.[22] She used two Arricam LT cameras and Panavision Primo lenses.[23] Roger Bellés was the art director and Ana López Cobos the costume designer. Alberto Gutiérrez edited the film.[24]
Calvo and Ambrossi broke up their 13-year long relationship during the shooting. Although, according to sources consulted by El País, the separation was not going to disrupt ongoing and future professional projects by Los Javis, including the rest of the shooting.[25]
Release
The film had its world premiere at the 79th Cannes Film Festival on 21 May 2026.[26][27] For its Australian premiere, the film made it to the lineup of the 73rd Sydney Film Festival.[28]
Goodfellas took over international sales.[29] Elastica will handle theatrical distribution in Spain.[11] The release in Spanish theatres was originally scheduled for 2 October 2026, but was later brought forward to 25 September 2026.[30][13] Co-producer Le Pacte is scheduled to release the film in French theatres on 16 December 2026.[31][32]
Shortly after its Cannes premiere, a bidding war ensued for U.S. distribution rights to the film, with A24, Netflix, Mubi, and Neon believed to be among the interested companies.[33] Netflix ultimately won in a deal worth around $4–5 million, with a multi-week theatrical release obligation and plans for an awards campaign.[24] Netflix subsequently set a 4-week theatrical window starting on 6 November 2026 before the film's U.S. streaming debut on 4 December 2026.[34]
Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 88% of 32 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 8.6/10.[35]
Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 85 out of 100, based on 12 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[36]
Elsa Fernández-Santos of El País deemed The Black Ball to be "a moving and ambitious search of the Spanish queer identity", despite some excesses, otherwise featuring a stunning Penélope Cruz in a brilliant scene pumping up the troops.[37]
Guy Lodge of Variety lamented that while the ambitious film "occasionally strikes a poetic note worthy of its historical muse, it more often plays as turgidly overblown melodrama".[9]
Sophie Monks Kaufman of IndieWire gave the film an 'A' rating, wondering about the near impossibility of grasping "the structural effort required to fluidly create one perfectly coherent story using three narratives told across three timelines, each with a distinct visual identity".[38]
Richard Lawson of The Hollywood Reporter underscored the film as "a dazzling mix of contemporary pop sensibility and classical filmmaking".[39]
Daniel de Partearroyo of Cinemanía rated the film 3 out of 5 stars, lamenting that it "is overwhelmed by an ambition with no way out", adding that "the soil [the film] is turning over has already been worked extensively, and its plough is not sharp enough to cut any deeper".[40]
Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian, rated the "rich and rewarding" movie 4 out of 5 stars, deeming it to be "handsomely produced, lovingly detailed and confidently constructed".[41]
Mariona Borrull of Fotogramas rated the film 4 out of 5 stars, declaring it "a sweeping two-and-a-half-hour epic", while considering the third act to be "heavy-going or overly didactic, verging on the corny".[42]
Lee Marshall of ScreenDaily described the film as a "stirring, timely reclamation of Spain's history and queer culture" but also as "a sprawling, undisciplined melodrama", otherwise being "more effective as an earnest, cumulative emotional journey than as a viewing experience".[43]
Davide Abbatescianni of Cineuropa assessed that the film "proves rewarding and often moving, even if it occasionally struggles under the weight of its own scale".[44]
In a 5-star rating, Luis Martínez of El Mundo wrote that what the film brings to the table is, first and foremost, "a jolt of baroque, melodramatic emotion which, in its overwhelming intensity, appears proud and joyful even in its mistakes".[45]
Zachary Lee of TheWrap billed The Black Ball as "one of those rare films that feels both old and new",[46] while Douglas Greenwood of i-D commended it as "grandiose historical epic".[47] Siddhant Adlakha of Observer rated the film 4 out of 4 stars, commending it as a "magnificently moving triptych that feels at once novel and like a classically staged military epic".[48]
Accolades
| Year | Award | Category | Nominee(s) | Result | Ref. |
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2026 | Cannes Film Festival | Palme d'Or | La bola negra | Nominated | [49] |
| Best Director | Javier Ambrossi and Javier Calvo | Won[a] | |||
| 73rd Sydney Film Festival | GIO Audience Award for Best International Feature | Won | [50] | ||
Notes
- Tied with Paweł Pawlikowski for Fatherland
