Javier Bardem and Victoria Luengo Are the Reason to See This Film at GEMS

There is a particular kind of film that exists almost entirely in the space between two people — in the silences, the half-finished sentences, the things that get said sideways because saying them directly would be too much. The Beloved (El ser querido) is that kind of film. Directed by Rodrigo Sorogoyen and starring Javier Bardem and Victoria Luengo, it screens as a Florida Premiere at Miami Film Festival GEMS on Saturday, October 31 at 12:15 PM at Koubek Center.

Esteban Martínez (Bardem) is a celebrated Spanish film director — a legend, both for his work and for a past defined by addiction, violence, and excess. After 15 years abroad, he returns to Spain for a new project and offers his long-estranged daughter Emilia (Luengo) a role, ostensibly to help with her stalled acting career. Living together on set creates a closeness they haven't shared in years. It also reopens wounds that never fully healed.

Rodrigo Sorogoyen is one of the most important filmmakers working in Spain today. His 2022 film The Beasts — a slow-burn thriller about a French couple farming in rural Galicia who come into violent conflict with their neighbors — won the 2023 Miami Film Festival Marimbas Award and was Spain's submission for the Academy Awards. It announced Sorogoyen as a filmmaker of genuine international weight: precise, patient, and willing to let tension build until it becomes unbearable.

The Beloved is a different register — quieter, more interior — but the same formal control is evident. Sorogoyen and his longtime writing partner Isabel Peña have built a film that trusts its actors completely, and the actors deliver. The screenplay gives Bardem and Luengo room to work, and they use every inch of it.

Sorogoyen's The Beasts won the 2023 MFF Marimbas Award. The Beloved is his follow-up. It stars Javier Bardem. It is a Florida Premiere.

Javier Bardem is an Academy Award winner — Best Supporting Actor for No Country for Old Men — and one of the most commanding screen presences in world cinema. He has worked with the Coen Brothers, Woody Allen, Sam Mendes, and Ridley Scott. He was in The Room Next Door, Pedro Almodóvar's most recent film, which also screens at GEMS this year. Playing a director whose legend is inseparable from his damage is exactly the kind of role Bardem was built for.

Victoria Luengo is one of the most compelling actors working in Spanish cinema. She appeared in Sorogoyen's Antidisturbios and has built a reputation for work that is emotionally precise without ever being showy. As Emilia — the daughter who has spent years building a life at a safe distance from her father — she carries the film's emotional center.

The Beloved (El ser querido) screens on Saturday, October 31 at 12:15 PM at Koubek Center, 2705 SW 3rd St, Miami, FL 33135. Directed by Rodrigo Sorogoyen. Spain / France, 2026. 135 minutes. In Spanish. Florida Premiere. Special Presentation. Book tickets at miamifilmfestival.com.