Afternoons of Solitude

Name: Afternoons of Solitude
Genre: Documentary
Released: June 27, 2025
Duration: 125 min
Rating: 85

2025

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Universal acclaim based on 12 Critic Reviews

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Movie Details & Credits

Grasshopper Film | Release Date: June 27, 2025 | Not Rated

Summary: Afternoons of Solitude is a spellbinding documentary that turns its gaze on the ceremonial splendor and devastating brutality of bullfighting in Spain. With quiet intensity, Serra follows famed matador Andrés Roca Rey, from the solitude of his hotel room and the meticulousness of his preparations to the charged spectacle of the arena.Afternoons of Solitude is a spellbinding documentary that turns its gaze on the ceremonial splendor and devastating brutality of bullfighting in Spain. With quiet intensity, Serra follows famed matador Andrés Roca Rey, from the solitude of his hotel room and the meticulousness of his preparations to the charged spectacle of the arena. Through his immersive and unhurried lens, Serra reveals Rey’s profound physical, spiritual, and aesthetic commitment to a centuries-old ritual—one that demands he take part in a timeless duel between man and beast.… Expand

Genre(s): Documentary

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 125 min

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Critic Reviews

100

David Jenkins

Sep 1, 2025

The film offers no explicit commentary or context, but instead allows the images to speak for themselves. Read full review

100

RogerEbert.com Glenn Kenny

Jun 27, 2025

Serra’s meticulous shooting and cutting relate to phenomenology; that is, it delivers an account of subjective experience. It implies that Rey’s “personality” is superfluous to his being. Read full review

Robert Abele

Jul 21, 2025

In its graceful intertwining of meditation and obscenity, Afternoons of Solitude gives an ancient, controversial tradition the chance to shock and awe without hype or favor. It’s inhumane, it’s human and it’s a hell of a film. Read full review

Guy Lodge

Oct 3, 2024

The film’s gaze is arguably as mocking as it is dazzled — with the macho posturing and hero-worship of Roca Rey a tacit source of comedy — while Serra, living up to his reputation for challenging arthouse fare, doesn’t flinch in his presentation of animal abuse and suffering. Read full review

Richard Brody

Jun 24, 2025

Though “Afternoons of Solitude” shows only the present tense of bullfighting, it looks deep into history and spotlights the tragic contradictions of modern life itself. Read full review

David Rooney

Oct 3, 2024

Any thoughts about the violence we’re seeing are strictly our own, never fed to us by the filmmaker. That makes Afternoons of Solitude, in its uncompromising way, a doc as muscular and ferocious as the poor creatures being ritualistically slaughtered in those bullrings. Read full review

William Repass

Jun 23, 2025

In the absence of any overt commentary, the film’s more open-ended choices in editing and music take on added significance. Read full review

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