The opening entry of the festival slate features the director’s first documentary to compete, wrapped in controversy because it centers on bullfighting. The film Tardes de Soledad follows Peruvian torero Andres Roca Rey, one of the most celebrated artists in the arena today, both in the moments inside the ring and in the rituals that precede and follow it. The work carries potential to provoke both supporters of tauromaquia and defenders of animal rights, yet for those seeking artistic merit over ideological battlegrounds, there is something more: a rare immersion into a territory that has remained largely unexplored, paired with a visual and sonic experience that is dazzling, hypnotic, and brutally honest.
Across the board, there is broad agreement that the film is magnificent. Is the filmmaker disappointed?
He notes that during the press screening a few people stepped out of the cinema, and that is not unusual. When he premiered Honor de Cavalleria at Cannes in 2006, a large portion of the audience left early. Provocation today, he suggests, has shifted in meaning. What provokes now is the choice to provoke less, to pursue honesty, to be sincere even when it risks reception.
Does it bother him to be labeled a provocateur?
He says it does not bother him because he does not care what others think. As Michel Houellebecq once observed, a provocateur is someone who interprets reality to serve personal gain, something he never aims to do. His films follow an internal logic, with formal justifications that stand on their own. He does not chase fame or popularity. If he avoided risk, he would not be true to his methods or his art.
He has explained that his choice to make a documentary about tauromaquia stems from seeing it as an art that refuses to be bourgeois. In the ring, the maestro lays life on the line. In a moment in the film, someone shouts that life is worth nothing, and the point is that life should be spent to achieve something meaningful, to expend it if necessary for a cause worthy of sacrifice, and that is the essence of the bull’s world. The idea is not about mercilessly wasting life; it is about a commitment to action, even in the face of danger. The notion of sacrifice is central to the art as it unfolds in the arena, not a mere pastime or spectacle.
The PACMA movement attempted to halt the film’s premiere at the festival. How does he view that effort?
He finds censorship of art to be a fragile, almost pretentious act. A work of art bears witness to itself, and its value lies in how it speaks to viewers, not in the opinions about it before the audience has even watched. What others think of the film as a piece of cinema matters far less to him than its artistic logic and the dialogue it invites about the subject matter itself.
He is asked if he supports tauromaquia.
Yes. He hopes it endures and is not banned. Yet society is shifting, veganism is in vogue, and the debate about animal protection becomes political. If protecting animals means imposing veganism by law, why not? He concedes that veganism has clear health benefits and that many laws regulate behavior in other areas. Still, he insists that politics is not his arena. The film argues that tauromaquia is more than entertainment; it carries a significant, almost transcendent dimension. Whether one loves it or despises it, the cinema presents it as a serious subject for contemplation, not a mere spectacle, and people are free to form their own opinions about it.
The film shows the deaths of several bulls in close-up and with unflinching detail. Did he ever hesitate about this approach?
He prefers to frame it as a portrayal of life leaving the animal. There are two aspects about the fighting bull that often go unseen. First, its genetics claim a unique edge in aggression, and second, it is unaware of death. Even in nature there are animals that kill each other for reasons unrelated to food. If one claims there is beauty in the bull’s death inside the arena, they might call him unhinged, yet he asserts that there is something poetic in that moment of surrender to fate.