Lucy Virgen: The Most Necessary Films in Latin America and Spain
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VERDICT: Films with unusual form, unique content, that gave hope in 2025.
In the convulsive and divided 2025 world, one frequently read in reviews the phrase, “this is the film we need now”. This phrase was generally associated with comedies. Yes, we need laughs, smiles at least, but we also need films unusual in content or form, original in their representations, or able to give us hope. Here is a personal list of the best and most “necessary” films in Latin America and Spain now.
SIRAT (Oliver Laxe –Spain)
The first, very powerful scenes of Sirat take place at a rave in the Moroccan desert, where Luis (Sergi López) and his son Esteban (Bruno Nuñez) arrive like aliens from another civilization. They are looking for Mar, Luis’ daughter. This is a real rave, so nothing is stylized. Luckily, Laxe teams with producers that gave him the freedom to be daring, imperfect, to work with naturalistic actors and make a film with a very tenuous narrative line, without a clear end. The music from Kanding Ray is a perfect complement to the cinematography by Mauro Herce .
O AGENTE SECRETO (Kleber Mendoça Filho– Brazil)
The Secret Agent uses humor and irony to recreate the hardships of the dictatorship in the 1970’s. In those days a secret agent could be anybody: a university researcher, a professor, an elderly landlady… The great Kleber Mendoça Filho directs Walter Moura, two Brazilian stars that no festival can resist. The memory of past dictatorships is especially timely today for those who flirt with autocratic goverments.
EN EL CAMINO (David Pablos – Mexico)
Is love possible amid narcos, bullets, revenge and 18-wheeler trucks? Mexican director David Pablos’s answer is a strong “yes” in his film On the Road, which won the Orizzonti Award in Venice and Fipresci Award in Havana. An LGBT+ road movie that also explores the journey of desire, it tells the story of Muñeco (Osvaldo Sánchez) and Veneno (Víctor Prieto), a long-distance driver and a hustler.
HISTORIAS DEL BUEN VALLE (Jose Luis Guerin – Spain)
Stories of the Good Valley is a mosaic of stories about Vallbon (Good Valley in Catalan) on the outskirts of Barcelona, and its inhabitants. Spanish director Jose Luis Guerin did a documentary -a mix of observation and talking heads- about the history and everyday life of a place when solidarity and lack of prejudice allows locals and migrants from all the world live, suffer and have fun together.
SI NO ARDEMOS COMO ILUMINAR LA NOCHE (Costa Rica)
Latin American cinema always needs renovating with invigorating new faces. If We Don’t Burn, How Do We Light Up the Night is a remarkable first film from a country with little film production. Director Kim Torres carefully avoids melodrama and delivers a coming-of-age tale in rural Costa Rica where Laura, the main character, must decide if a series of feminicides have a supernatural or a human cause.
