La Bola Negra opens in UK cinemas with a queer epic spanning three generations

La Bola Negra has opened in UK and Irish cinemas, bringing Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s Cannes prize-winning drama to audiences this weekend. Released by Altitude on Friday 6 November, the Spanish-language film connects three generations of men through desire, family history and the legacy of writer Federico García Lorca.

Penélope Cruz and Glenn Close appear alongside Guitarricadelafuente, Miguel Bernardeau, Carlos González and Milo Quifes. Its arrival follows a festival run that included Cannes and the BFI London Film Festival, giving viewers who missed those screenings a chance to see the film in regular cinema programmes.

What is La Bola Negra about?

The story moves between Spain in 1932, 1937 and 2017. In its earliest strand, a young man waits to discover whether he has been accepted into a local social club. The wartime section follows a soldier and a prisoner, while the contemporary story concerns a historian who inherits a document from his grandfather.

Those starting points, outlined in the BFI’s festival introduction, allow the film to explore what one generation passes to another. The connections involve more than family relationships: silences, suppressed memories and the difficulty of speaking openly run through all three periods.

The film draws on Lorca’s unfinished work of the same name and Alberto Conejero’s play La Piedra Oscura. Conejero co-wrote the screenplay with Calvo and Ambrossi. Lorca’s presence runs through the project, but the filmmakers have built an ensemble drama rather than a conventional account of the poet’s life.

A Cannes award for the directors behind Veneno

Calvo and Ambrossi, widely known as Los Javis, shared the Best Director prize at the 2026 Cannes Film Festival with Paweł Pawlikowski for Fatherland. The festival’s official winners’ list confirms the joint award, announced on 23 May.

Their earlier television work includes Paquita Salas, Veneno and La Mesías. Their creative partnership began with the stage production La Llamada, which they adapted into a film in 2017. La Bola Negra is their second feature, expanding their work from contemporary television stories into a drama crossing much of a century.

In its introduction to the film, Cannes highlighted the directors’ interest in the experiences of earlier generations of gay men and the ways those lives were silenced. That concern links the historical scenes to the modern-day story, rather than confining queer history to a distant past.

Writing in Sight and Sound, critic Elisabet Cabeza described how the film combines Lorca’s unfinished drama with the Civil War story and a contemporary investigation of family history. Her review also identifies musician Guitarricadelafuente as a first-time actor, playing Sebastián opposite Bernardeau’s Rafael.

The ensemble assigns different perspectives to each period. Quifes plays Carlos, González plays Alberto and Lola Dueñas plays Teresa. Cruz appears as Nené, with Close as Isabelle. The official Cannes credits also name Gris Jordana as cinematographer, Roger Bellés as production designer and Raül Refree as composer.

For viewers familiar with the directors’ television work, the film offers another collaboration built around an ensemble. Here, the characters inhabit different decades, making the movement between their stories central to how the shared history is revealed.

Where UK audiences can see the film

Altitude’s cinema finder provides a starting point for local screenings. Dates vary by venue, so the national release date does not mean every cinema is showing it on the same days.

In London, Ciné Lumière’s programme lists a screening on Sunday 8 November at 4.30pm, with further dates through 17 November. Nottingham’s Broadway cinema also lists Sunday screenings and performances during the following week. Both offer a way to catch the opening run outside a festival setting.

For audiences in Scotland, Dundee Contemporary Arts has announced dates from 13 to 26 November. The cinema lists the film in Spanish with English subtitles and a 15 certificate. Booking pages carry the relevant local times and availability for anyone planning a visit.