We are living through an age of war and savagery. Few films I have seen have captured the latter with quite the unremitting insistence as Serra’s bullfighting doc. It’s a relentless attack on the viewer’s senses, as we watch the spectacle of death unfurl time after time. It is a spectacle indeed, as the preening bullfighter, Andrés Roca Rey, dandies his way through the killing fields in his exquisite, homoerotic costume. Most of the film takes place within the bullring, punctuated with scenes of the team in the back of a minivan, but one intricate sequence shows Roca Rey getting dressed, almost being winched into his skintight costume by his batman. The scenes beyond the ring are the viewer’s breathing space. In the ring, Serra’s camera, welded with surgical effectiveness by DOP Artur Tort, captures every straining sinew of both torero and bull. The blood flows down the bulls’ flanks. After the coup de grace is executed, the bulls are dragged away unceremoniously, their might reduced to nothing more than dense flesh. The camera offers a different view of the spectacle to that of the stalls. There’s no hiding from the cruelty or the torero’s valour. The torero’s face contorts with courage and concentration. In this the film is reminiscent of Douglas Gordon’s remarkable Zidane. But it also possesses the unflinching violence of an Ulrich Seidl film. You want to look away. You don’t want to watch the act of killing. Just as we always look away from the killings, day after day. Tardes de Soledad is a fitting film for this age of savagery.
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