‘The Beloved’ Review: Javier Bardem Is a Hotheaded Director in Spanish Daughter-Daddy Drama in Search of a Better Script
Javier Bardem stars as Esteban Martinez, a volatile and acclaimed filmmaker attempting a comeback by casting his estranged daughter Emilia in his new film 'Desierto'. The film explores their fraught relationship, marked by abandonment and dysfunction, as they navigate personal and professional tensions on a desert shoot. Despite strong performances, 'The Beloved' is criticized for its meandering script and lackluster visual style.
- ▪Javier Bardem plays Esteban Martinez, a two-time Oscar and Palme d'Or-winning director making a comeback with a 1930s period film.
- ▪Esteban's estranged daughter Emilia, played by Victoria Luengo, is cast in the lead role despite their troubled history and his past absences.
- ▪The film features a prolonged opening scene between Bardem and Luengo that sets a tense, improvisatory tone for the drama.
- ▪'The Beloved' runs 130 minutes and has been criticized for its slow pacing and unengaging depiction of the film production process.
- ▪Director Rodrigo Sorogoyen uses multiple visual formats, but the desert setting and nested production narrative contribute to a visually flat experience.
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| Original publisher | IndieWire |
| Canonical URL | https://www.indiewire.com/criticism/movies/the-beloved-review-javier-bardem-1235194464/ |
| Publication time | Sun, 17 May 2026 08:17:10 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-17T08:52:12.990Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-17T08:52:12.990Z |
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Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Javier Bardem plays a hotheaded filmmaker, one of those “brilliant assholes” mostly incapable of making great art without wringing it out of tyrannical behavior, in Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s Spanish industry drama “The Beloved.” The director of a memorable 2019 movie called “Madre,” a warped tale of motherhood in which a woman strikes up an affair with a dead ringer of her long-lost son, now turns his camera (or cameras, as Sorogoyen experiments with many visual formats to bewildering effect here) on fatherhood and its sins. Bardem stars as Esteban Martinez, who is casting the leading female role in his new film “Desierto,” a role he has written for his estranged daughter Emilia (Victoria Luengo).
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