Alcarràs and the New Spanish Realism: Non-Professional Actors and the Politics of Place

Using Carla Simón's film Alcarràs (2022) as a case study, this article traces the development of a new realism in Spanish cinema, one that places a growing emphasis on non-professional actors and an elegiac contemplation of rural or isolated locations. I demonstrate that while this realist turn has an affective attachment to questions of locality and locatedness, it has developed through more explicit exchange with global realist practices than with traditional models of national realism. The article also more broadly shows how non-professional performance in cinema can usher in new understandings of place and physical connectedness in times of environmental crisis.