There’s no way to sum up this film in a simple paragraph or two, but I’ll do my best to hit the high points. There are three stories, all set in Spain, centuries apart, unfolding simultaneously.

A traipse through a century of Spanish history as seen through a few gay icons, La Bola Negra is a very fashionable film, at once a conscious entry in contemporary cinema’s ongoing fixation with the archive and a throwback to Miramax Oscar Bait, characterized not inaccurately as The Hours for Federico Garcia Lorca.