Afternoons of Solitude (Tardes de soledad)

 

Director Albert Serra

AFTERNOONS OF SOLITUDE (Tardes de soledad)                     B+                                Spain  France  Portugal  (125 mi)  2024  d: Albert Serra

The bullfighter was bent with the bull, he cimbred his waist on the exquisite brushstroke of the right, embarked the natural with velvet caress.  And the helper.  And the chest pass in amalgam of depth and art.  And the serenity of holding a break with the pythons in centimeters of the thighs.  And the knee on the ground to screw the bull in follow-up of the deception.  And the crutch on the left again for the natural deep.  And the trench again.  And the quiquiriquí.  And the signing pass.  And scarlet flame in change of hand.  And the bull returned to deceit, seized on his flights.  Harmony, cadence, bewitchment.                                                                          —Joaquín Vidal, Spanish journalist treating bullfighting not just as a spectacle, but as a fleeting art form to be described with intense sensory detail

Any way you want to look at it, this film is shocking in every respect, yet filmed with an unflinching eye by Catalan cinematographer Artur Tort, who also co-edits the film with the director, using three outstanding cameras and magnificent sound equipment, where the overall work is so much more impressive than in his subsequent work in Lav Diaz’s Magellan (Magalhães) (2025), and despite the devastatingly horrific nature of some of what we see, it’s presented with unmistakable elegance, brutal and poetic at the same time, begging the question, is it art or is it barbarism?  A formally minimalistic, documentary portrait of the legendary twenty-nine year old, still-active Peruvian bullfighter Andrés Roca Rey (Home - Web oficial del torero Andrés Roca Rey), the equivalent of Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo in the soccer world, this is the director’s first nonfiction film, listed at #1 from Cahiers du Cinéma: Top 10 Films of 2025, #6 from Film Comment: Best Films of 2025, and #6 from Richard Brody: New Yorker: The Best Films of 2025, and winner of the Golden Seashell for top prize at Spain’s 2024 San Sebastián Film Festival.  It’s a film about archaic rituals and tradition, about the people who know a lot about it, and are the specialists in their field.  The ornate and colorful style may remind viewers of Pedro Almodóvar’s Matador (1987), where Roca Rey is considered the world’s most famous matador, as the film immerses itself in the old-fashioned world of the bull ring, pitting one man alone against the immense power of a bull, where it’s a battle to the death, though the odds are stacked against the animal, bloodied by a series of lances into the spine or shoulders prior to the final few passes, eventually falling to their deaths, exposing the brutality of the sport, which is why bullfighting is illegal in most countries with the exception of specific regions of Spain, Portugal, France, Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, Peru, and Ecuador, where it is viewed as an essential, historic cultural event, appealing more to those on the right wing, who view male virility and macho tradition as a form of nationalist expression.  No argument is made here, making no overt comment about bullfighting, with no talking heads promoting any of the various points of view, instead it is a pure cinematic exhibition playing out onscreen as it happens inside the ring, where you can hear but never see the crowd, using a repetitive style that allows viewers to enter the near hypnotic relationship between the matador and the bull, where the emphasis is on the developing psychological standoff, relying upon skill and agility in his maneuvers and his elegant use of the cape, typically killing the animal with a single sword-thrust that leads to its collapse.  The danger to the matador is equally intense, as bulls occasionally gore them, or flip them upside down, with the opportunity to stomp them to death, or pierce their hearts or lungs, even subjecting their faces to their horns, and while never mentioned in the film, there are famous matadors who died in the ring, one during a live television broadcast in Spain, Víctor Barrio, a 29-year old Spanish matador who was killed in 2016 when a bull’s horn pierced his chest in front of live spectators, dying just a few minutes later.  Balancing the graceful choreography with the brutality, exposing an extremely stylized ritual, and the insane courage that someone must have to stand face-to-face with such a massively powerful animal, this is a movie about looking death in the eye, knowing the risks, yet exposing themselves anyway while defying the possibility of dying.  When Roca Rey is badly injured by a bull, his first reflex is not to look for a doctor, but to go back into the arena bleeding hard to become victorious against that same bull in front of a delirious crowd.  Tradition and performance, also history and the present are so directly interwoven into the film, where the very different reactions indicate that Serra has in fact found the right balance, neither a clear glorification nor a strong condemnation, rather somewhere in the middle, offering an invitation to reflection.

In a sport loved by Hemingway, Picasso, Dalí, Goya, Lorca, Gustave Doré, and Manet, recalling Hemingway’s 263-page 1932 essay Ernest Hemingway DEATH IN THE AFTERNOON (pdf), which likely influenced the title, all seeing the beauty, tragedy, and even mysticism in it, the film offers no history or backstory, but simply places us inside the spectacle of the ring, exposing the ceremonial splendor and devastating brutality from extremely close range, where the camerawork is simply outstanding, offering astonishing views of such a controversial sport, as we hear the groaning sounds of the matador encouraging the bull, and the exhaustive snorts of the animal, elevating what we see to performance art.  This sport goes back to Roman gladiator entertainment when slaves were forced to battle wild animals in a Colosseum ring surrounded by a hyped up and frenzied crowd, while bullfighting in Spain goes back to the 8th century, going through various iterations of banishment and public performance, revived in the 18th century, where Seville has been credited with founding modern Spanish-style bullfighting.  The great Spanish filmmaker Carlos Saura made his feature movie debut in a film centered around bullfighting, LOS GOLFOS (The Delinquents) (1960), the first Spanish movie filmed entirely on location, while Italian filmmaker Francesco Rosi made THE MOMENT OF TRUTH (1965), an equally compelling elegy to a great bullfighter.  Remaining controversial throughout the centuries, most would probably find the sport abhorrent, where killing an animal for sport is the Spanish working class equivalent to the aristocratic tradition of British fox-hunting on horseback, or the pheasant and rabbit hunting seen in Renoir’s THE RULES OF THE GAME (1939), with hounds chasing after them until the animal is shot, effectively becoming a symbol of the callousness, moral decay, and frivolous nature of the upper class, while also paralleling the slaughter of the coming war (WWI).  But this is much more bloody and brutal, featuring massive animals weighing over 1000 pounds literally dripping with blood, where it can be seen as grotesque, but that’s where the aesthetic artistry of the filmmaker gives this a different sense, as it’s unflinchingly visceral, seductive and distancing at the same time, almost like a religious experience, a glimpse of the sacred and the profane, or a transcendent search for the sublime, always shown with a painterly gaze.  Seen through the eyes of the bullfighter, with his unusual posture, extravagant poses and facial expressions, where it’s all about agility, rhythm, and timing, much like a ballet dancer, we also hear the sounds of the spectacle, accentuating the intimate language between the matador and the bull, as well as the encouraging cries of his handlers nearby, who are themselves lesser-scale matadors and can be heard in a running dialogue contemptuously insulting the bull, using the most profane language, while also heaping the most effusive praise to the matador.  We hear the aura that still permeates around the figure of the bullfighter, as we follow his charismatic presence to his limousine, hotel room, and dressing room, exposing his many behind-the-scenes rituals, drinking water out of a silver cup on the sidelines that no one else touches, always surrounded by an exclusively male support staff, where he’s treated like a rock star.  Mostly eliminating the introductory ceremonial splendor of the processional sounds of the trumpets before entering the ring, instead Serra pays particular attention to the moments just before the death of the animal, who by this time is physically exhausted, where the camera just lingers, as the matador exhibits fearlessness and showmanship by turning his back to the animal to recognize the audience with a salute, literally standing just a few feet in front of the animal, then turning with the red cape behind him, the object the bull is charging, taking so many risks, but it’s all part of the operatic spectacle in this macabre dance of death.  The closeness the matador comes to the animal is nothing less than shocking, which is part of what makes this film so uniquely compelling.     

Filmed in the grandest arenas of Madrid, Seville, and Bilbao, where the sport is currently in freefall in Spain, with the number of fights cut in half in the last 20 years in a trend that is only continuing, essentially abolished in Catalonia where no fights have occurred since 2011.  In Barcelona, a cinema within a shopping center lies at the exact spot where one of its three bullrings once existed.  The Catalan filmmaker is a graduate of the University of Barcelona, whose style relies upon the acute powers of observation, where there are definitely a few moments in this film that are staggeringly difficult to watch, as the barbarous nature of how the animal is treated—and filmed—is openly on display, where the blood never stops flowing, literally becoming a ritualistic sacrifice and public spectacle, where especially chilling are those close-ups just after the animal has fallen, often going through convulsive twitches, as we literally see him put to death with a knife directly into the skull, severing his spinal cord while writhing in agony, as ropes are attached to the horns before he gets dragged out of the ring by a team of horses.  This is not for the faint of heart, completely defying conventional wisdom, as animals are definitely harmed in the making of this film, which is rarely seen anymore.  That, by itself, is grotesque, but that is not all we see, where you have to put the entire film in context, revolving more around the psychological mindset of the matador, including the rituals in preparation for the battle, crossing himself three times before he puts on his jacket, humbly kissing the rosary chain with the cross, addressing many prayers to God and the Virgin, while kissing a weeping Madonna portrait, but above all he exudes calmness and seclusion, never allowing us into his world of single-minded focus, accentuating his ability to read the bulls, knowing about them in great detail, including who their breeders are.  What stands out is his extraordinary concentration, as he has to please the crowd by making it a good fight to the finish, where despite the massive loss of blood, these bulls amazingly keep charging and never seem to give up, as they are bred and trained for this unique moment.  The title does say it all, as in the ring, while there are plenty of others around to distract the animal when necessary, it’s all about the bravery of one man alone, where he has to accentuate that fearlessness by coming so close to death himself, always viewed with elegance and grace, while at the same time the camera brings viewers closer than they could ever be in real life, a directness that only cinema can produce.  That’s the mesmerizing aspect of this, as it simply takes us where no one else has ever been.  As if to counterbalance the violence of what happens in the ring, there is a score by Barcelona-based composer Marc Verdaguer, but it’s heavily overshadowed by the calming elegance of the Valse Triste by Sibelius, Jean Sibelius, Valse Triste (orch.Herbert von Karajan) YouTube (6:21), which just sounds otherworldly in this environment, yet the pièce de résistance is the Jefferson Airplane from 1967, specifically guitarist Jorma Kaukonen’s solo piece Embryonic Journey YouTube (1:52), which plays as he’s getting dressed against a white backdrop in that tightly fitting, heavily embroidered, brightly colorful and extravagantly decorative, sequined costume, which is its own ritual, looking like something Goya might have painted.  Roca Rey has his own brushes with death, getting gored on one occasion, getting pinned against the boards in another, and nearly mauled, but he escapes with his life, saved by the quick actions of his team, where you wonder if this film would have been made if he hadn’t survived, where we’re left with this ominous feeling that something could always happen inside the ring.  So in a sense this is a snuff film, much like many National Geographic television episodes that routinely show animal killings in the wild, revealing the catastrophes of nature, but this accentuates the psychological interplay between the immense size of the bull and a lone matador who puts his life on the line every time he enters the ring.  Yes, it’s all stacked in his favor, and it’s a cruel exhibition, but there’s also extraordinary beauty to be found, where that stunning aspect alone is the highlight of this film.       

Note

In 2015-16, at the age of twenty, Andrés Roca Rey was listed as the worst matador of all time by the British tabloid The Sun, earning a reputation early in his career for an intense, high-risk style that resulted in a remarkable number of serious injuries and high-profile gorings.  In each of his first five bullfights, he was gored five times, with multiple, rapid-succession injuries including losing two teeth after a bull hit him in the mouth, while the next time his jaw shattered, suffering another goring in the mouth, and then sustaining a 10cm-long injury in the buttock region with a severed abdominal muscle, as he was catapulted into the air and transported to the hospital.  However, this only trajected him into eternal fame, as Roca Rey would later fight hundreds more bulls, and today he is known as the only matador who can fill Spanish stadiums on his own.  Capturing him at the peak of his powers is like filming Messi or Michael Jordan at the apex of their careers.  

Don't Look Back

 

Marianne Faithfull in the corner

manager Albert Grossman

Donovan

Director D. A. Pennebaker

Pennebaker with Dylan

Pennebaker holding the camera

Dylan with Howard Alk on the left

Dylan with Alk

DON’T LOOK BACK           A                                                                                               USA  (96 mi)  1967  d: D.A. Pennebaker

I ain’t lookin’ to compete with you,
Beat or cheat or mistreat you,
Simplify you, classify you,
Deny, defy or crucify you...

—Bob Dylan - All I Really Want To Do (Live in Liverpool - 1965 ... outtake footage filmed by Pennebaker, YouTube (3:40)

Made during Dylan’s 1965 solo tour of England, but released in 1967, this is the definitive portrait of the artist at an early stage of his career, a time when he was still only 23, yet it’s the height of his worldwide success, where the film has become an iconic rock document, an anthem for 60’s youth culture.  Pennebaker and Chicago filmmaker Howard Alk, one of the cinematographers on the film who would later direct The Murder of Fred Hampton (1971), had unprecedented access, and a brief temporal window behind the scenes that allows viewers to just hang out with the artist for a while as he’s on the verge of becoming internationally famous, with Dylan captured onscreen as he never would be again, offering a rare emotional intimacy that no subsequent documentary has achieved.  This is a film about the 60’s as seen through the dizzying life of one of the standard-bearers of that tumultuous decade, where he is to the 60’s what Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg were to the 50’s.  His Ginsberg-like stream-of-conscious words are an aggressive assault to the senses, where the meaning remains highly ambiguous, while his style is constantly changing, and his notorious avoidance of publicity borders on the obsessive, yet he remains the influential voice of the era.  One sequence that stands out, as if pulled out of time from a different era, is Ed Emshwiller footage of Dylan singing outdoors to farmhands two years earlier during a voter registration drive in the cotton fields of Greenwood, Mississippi, Dont Look Back (1967) -- (Movie Clip) Only A Pawn In Their ... YouTube (3:20), where he transitions from a younger version of himself to a live performance on this tour, mirroring the shift from folk traditions to a new terrain of rock.  Filmed during a three week concert tour in the spring of 1965, it’s not so much a documentary as it is a window into a private side of one of our more revered artists, a look behind the curtain, where his sneering intellectual arrogance on display and his disdain for others marks his turf as an insufferable egotist, yet there are throngs of admirers waiting to see him perform, where every concert is sold out.  It’s relaxed and informal, with no set format or criteria, perhaps only visualized in the editing room, which happened very quickly in a matter of weeks, displaying a remarkable gift for weaving music into the visuals so that each seemed to become indistinguishable from the other, reflective of the volcanic social and political transformations taking place during the 60’s, creating not only a revolutionary cinéma vérité approach to a road tour, but a new form of social commentary, bringing it to the mainstream, offering one of the most intimate glimpses possible of the perpetually elusive Bob Dylan.  An artist receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama in 2012 and who would be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2016 for his “new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition,” with literary allusions to a wide swath of notable poets and writers from Homer to Shakespeare to William Blake, Arthur Rimbaud, James Joyce, T.S. Eliot, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac, but in the early years no one really knew what to make of him, and this gritty exposé of the good, the bad and the ugly reflects that mysterious confusion, containing a wide variety of mixed emotions.  A frustrating, puzzling, illuminating, and fleeting portrait of the artist as a young man, originally shot in black and white on handheld 16mm, with blurred grainy images of fast monochrome film, where cigarette smoke permeates every frame, much of the film takes place in a cramped hotel room at the Savoy in London, where the tight quarters only accentuate an atmosphere of intimacy, wandering around backstage, conducting interviews, meeting with fans, taking limo rides, creating a feeling of actually being there.  There is no narrative, and there are no talking heads, with no attempts to define or explain who he is, so it’s such an individualized, interior, free-associating experience that may play out differently for each individual viewer, offering an unflinching gaze into the darker corners of Dylan’s persona.  According to Pennebaker, “Dylan is an interesting person to watch because he is constantly creating himself, and then standing back and trying to witness it,” while according to Dylan, “What happened, [in the sixties] happened so fast, that people are still trying to figure it out.”  You may be able to recognize Joan Baez, Marianne Faithfull, Donovan, former Animals organist Alan Price just after he left the group, that’s him on The Animals - House of the Rising Sun (1964) + clip comp. 60 ... YouTube (4:32), Dylan’s relentlessly aggressive, über manager Albert Grossman (the film is actually his idea), and Beat poet Allen Ginsberg by sight, where there is nothing to identify them otherwise, as they simply appear onscreen, part of the mosaic of intermingling personalities that comprise this film.   

This remarkable film was added to the National Film Registry in 1998, while in 2021 Rolling Stone magazine listed this as the #1 music documentary of all time, 70 Greatest Music Documentaries of All Time, described as an “obvious cultural reference point” and a “permanent blueprint for the public’s image of mid-Sixties rock & roll.”  It bears some resemblance to the weirdly scripted comedy of Richard Lester’s A HARD DAY’S NIGHT (1964), shot during the height of Beatlemania and coinciding with a world tour, where fans besieged their hotels, stole various items for souvenirs, and chased them around London.  Here wildly enthusiastic fangirls are waving to Dylan outside his hotel, hopelessly trying to get his attention, screaming with delight at any sign of him.  What distinguishes this film from other musical documentaries is that this is not a concert film, as none of the songs play out in full, which is actually the film’s biggest criticism, but it’s not that kind of film, where it’s more about the intangible moments in between the songs, with Dylan interacting with the press, hotel personnel, or other friends and musicians paying him a visit, occasionally breaking out in song.  One thing that stands out is that he is defiantly contrarian, not willingly agreeing with anyone, continually finding an antagonistic point of view, yet what’s fascinating is how he sees himself during this momentous period of his life, regarding it all suspiciously, where we literally watch him reading articles written about him, and then reacts as only Bob Dylan can, as he obviously gets a kick out of seeing himself in the news.  When Dylan reads an article that describes him as “puffing heavily on his cigarette, he smokes eighty a day,” he hilariously responds, “God, I’m glad I’m not me.”  Not just a songwriter and musician, but Dylan is also a poet, who attracted the interest of other poets, including fellow musician/poet Patti Smith, who has talked about the impact both Dylan and the film had on her as a young, struggling artist in New York, as she “related to everything he did, his magnetism and sexual energy.  He was nobody’s patsy,” something she describes as “the hubris of youth,” Patti Smith on Bob Dylan and DONT LOOK BACK YouTube (14:01).  This would be Dylan’s final acoustic tour, coming just after he released Bringing It All Back Home, as he began to move away from the folk movement from which he’d emerged, where the first side is all electric, while the second side is all acoustic, becoming his first album to incorporate electric instrumentation.  When he returned to England in 1966 it was for the electric tour that caused one outraged fan who felt so betrayed he shouted out “Judas,” a legendary moment of instantaneous frustration that pretty much defines his career evolution, as he continually evolves into new musical forms, never repeating any song the same way twice.  Curiously, according to photographer Daniel Kramer, who was sent to photograph him, finding him completely uncooperative, he rarely even plays the guitar except when performing.  The film hasn’t aged a bit, and feels as modern and timeless today as it was when it was released, offering a compelling critique of an intrusive media that can completely misunderstand its subjects through their own bias, yet still print distortions and inaccuracies anyway.  Pennebaker’s restless camerawork is perfectly suited for Dylan’s chameleon-like persona, never really answering any of the interviewers questions, typically turning the questions back around on them, often seen hiding behind his everpresent dark sunglasses that he strangely wears indoors, where you may not like him, but he’s very human, as openly flawed as the rest of us.  The title comes from Satchel Paige, the ageless Negro League baseball pitcher who famously remarked, “Don’t look back.  Someone might be gaining on you,” with Dylan offering his own retort, “He not busy being born is busy dying,” and since he so thoroughly carries the film, the focal point of every single second, he describes the film as Pennebaker by Dylan.  The opening two-and-a-half minutes is an improvisational music video (with some calling it the first) promotion for Dylan’s first Billboard-landing single and electric rock anthem, Subterranean Homesick Blues, Bob Dylan - Subterranean Homesick Blues (Official HD Video) YouTube (2:15), with Dylan fumbling through a series of cue cards that he drops to the ground after the words are sung, a shorthand for his momentous lyrics, which sets the tone for what follows, with an unidentified Allen Ginsberg in the background, where he and Kerouac used to refer to themselves as “subterraneans,” the title of a 1958 book by Kerouac, where there is an audio recording of him reading a passage from the book, Jack Kerouac Reads From 'The Subterraneans' (1958) YouTube (3:14).

Dylan’s snarly and petulant attitude, particularly with clueless reporters, may have simply been a defense mechanism against the overexposure in newspapers and magazines, where his music was as overplayed on the radio as the Beatles, because commercial radio loves repetition, elevating him to a Godlike status, which he shied away from, so his automatic impulses shut down those questions while making fun of just how ridiculous the situation was that he found himself in, literally jousting with reporters, viewing them as comic relief, Dont Look Back (1967) -- (Movie Clip) Lies And Rubbish YouTube (3:45), where people were asking him everything imaginable, no matter how personal or inappropriate, and then writing whatever the hell they pleased, often using broad, encompassing labels to describe him.  So there are moments when he’s being spectacularly obnoxious towards others, a real jerk, as if he couldn’t care less about them, using acerbic sarcasm as a weapon, yet he also has some indescribable endearing quality, where he seems genuinely authentic and quite comfortable just being himself.  Mixed altogether in a musical collage, we’re privy to a constantly changing mindset that offers an exemplary view of all the contradictions he was constantly dealing with, where it’s impressive that a document like this even exists, as we rarely get behind the façade of great artists, but this one really expresses all the adrenaline-laced, sped-up confusion wrapped up in the meticulously documented, jagged edges of the experience, with Dylan acutely aware that a camera is always on him, where every moment is a performance, yet this may also be who he really is, making things up as he goes along, like looking in a mirror at yourself while real life is happening, where you have to wonder at times if that guy you’re looking at is even you.  In a bewildering moment that comes out of nowhere, all hell breaks loose when Dylan throws an angry tantrum after learning someone threw a glass bottle out the window, causing all sorts of pandemonium mixed with an air of late night drunken revelry, Bob Dylan hotel argument about throwing glass in the street YouTube (2:59).  Lost among the barrage of Dylan clips is an extremely raw and revealing moment with Alan Price, coming at a particularly vulnerable time for an extremely talented artist, having left The Animals under questionable circumstances, where alcohol may have played a role, and while he’s barely onscreen except for a few moments, they are tinged with giddiness turning to heartbreak, where the instantly changing mood becomes something of a subplot for the film.  Dylan’s unidentified right hand man and friendly soulmate is his road manager Bob Neuwirth, a partner in crime with a long and influential association with Dylan, who is with him throughout this film, often acting as a sounding board, both cracking up over the enthusiastic press coverage of Donovan, described by the press as “England’s answer to Bob Dylan,” which becomes a running joke in the film, where his press clippings adorn the hotel mirrors and a concert poster appears in the hotel room draped across a couch, but they’re generally on the same wavelength, Bob Dylan and Bobby Neuwirth YouTube (47 seconds).  Joan Baez makes an early appearance and then disappears, something she has described as “the most demoralizing experience of my life,” apparently having enough of this self-obsessed Dylan guy, but she sings a beautiful song, Dont Look Back (1967) -- (Movie Clip) Percy's Song, Etc. YouTube (3:57), while Dylan completely ignores her, back turned, typing away on his reportedly amphetamine-fueled experimental novel Tarantula, released several years later, which baffled his critics and left his fans scratching their heads, while in this same sequence Marianne Faithfull can be seen tucked away in a corner, never saying a word.  Donovan actually appears in the hotel room and sings a nice, conventional folk song, Donovan - To Sing for You, Bob Dylan - It's All Over Now Baby ... YouTube (4:05), with Dylan watching nervously until Donovan asks if he’d give an impromptu performance of It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue, which is endearing and seems especially personalized, yet the coup de grâce may actually be an unused outtake from one of Dylan’s most sublimely gorgeous love songs, filled with symbolist wordplay, Bob Dylan - Love Minus Zero/No Limit (Live at Savoy Hotel 1965) [HD FOOTAGE] YouTube (3:42), a snippet of which played in concert closes the film.  It’s fair to say Donovan was one-upped here, and was likely overwhelmed by Dylan in a take no prisoners mode, where there was simply no one else like him in the entire universe.  Not an easy man to get along with, yet this film graces the screen with rare moments of down time, when he had time to kill, preparing for the actual moments when he would take the stage, as this entire film is a lead-in to that combustible moment when Dylan set the world on fire.