El niño y el traje de luces

A young boy grows up in a Spanish town with dreams of being a bullfighter in an age when tradition and modernity are in constant conflict.

A bullring sits at the heart of the 16th-century Spanish town of Castellón. Around it has risen residential tower blocks. It’s here that Borja lives. The boy’s grandfather, who once had dreams of being a bullfighter himself, now places the responsibility on Borjas’ shoulders, hoping he will carry on a tradition that is increasingly regarded as one of the last vestiges on a bygone era. But this dream also encapsulates a desire that the boy’s success will lift his family out of poverty. With intimate access to the family as they go about their daily lives, Inma de Reyes’s striking observational documentary highlights the uneasy relationship between past and present, capturing modern life across three generations with compassion and no small amount of empathy.