Editor's notes:

Author and journalist Jim Myers has been an aficionado of los toros since the early 1960s, when he lived, eventually for a decade, in Sevilla and Chipiona, Cadiz, Spain. He is, with the late Henry Higgins, the author of To Be a Matador, a chronicle of Higgins' struggles and successes as the first Englishman to reach the rank of matador de toros. Jim's work has more recently appeared in USA Today, USA Weekend, The Washington Post and Post Magazine, Atlantic Monthly and other publications.

On February 25 Jim attended the screening of the documentary film Matador, the theme of which is the life and career of the popular Spanish matador “El Fandi”. It was shown at the Avalon Teatre in Washington DC with the purpose of promoting the sale of the DVD version of the film. Jim participated in the discussion that followed the screening and has written his review of the film, and he gives his impressions of the film as well as of the circumstances related to the torero and the making of the film.

THE MATADOR, the highly praised documentary about "El Fandi", came to Washington last night, the day after it was released on  DVD. It says something, I suppose, that after 45 years or so watching bulls, I was swept up in the dazzling beauty of the film -- the Andalusian campo, the fiesta -- really all the things that frame our love of bullfighting in the first place.

 Filmmaker Nina Gilden Seavey joined in a discussion of the film afterwards (along with an admiring N Y Times reviewer) and the first thing I could think of was to compliment her how truly well she had captured the moods, tones and feelings of the fiesta. The film shows the emotional sun and shadows of that world amazingly well, while still being the effort of, essentially, outsiders.

Seavey, who neither started off as a bullfight enthusiast nor claims to be one now, says her involvement began when she was, more or less, handed a pile of film shot a year earlier and left to discover if there was a coherent product hidden in there somewhere. To her credit, she saw there was -- with some additional footage. 

As she tells it, she set out to bring an even-handed approach  to the project -- being neither for or against bullfighting, and I swear the fiesta may actually shine the brightest when approached this way. During the film, I had this thought: Sometimes, God does us the favor or protecting us from journalists, filmmakers, etc. who think they have something to say. At least sometimes.

Right in the middle of the film, there is the example of a  pretentious Anglo journalist who obviously thinks he is an aware, modern man asking "Fandi", who tends to answer questions in  the simple terms, about the true meaning of it all -- that is in reference to the mores and fads of contemporary European life, say in South Kensington  or wherever. This fellow claims to want to know just how this “sport” fits in, and the sequence is almost comic, if you can allow yourself to laugh. Or maybe you want to hide your face. But I suppose there are those in the world who assume that "El Fandi" approaches each act of each  bullfight with the question, “Should I really be doing this in the 21st Century?”

Later, "Fandi" casually says something interesting about the alleged controversial aspect of his trade, something truly wonderful for those of us who remember past decades in Spain. “It’s a free country,” he says. “Everybody can have their own opinions.”

The film is constructed along the story line of a teenager who grows up thinking that to fight 100 corridas a year would be to realize his wildest dreams. It’s a simplistic notion -- from a seemingly simple guy. Meanwhile, I already know Fandi’s story pretty well, maybe even in greater detail than the picture shows. But I found the 100-corrida ambition "worked" as the film's narrative frame, because, even to me, it was emotionally satisfying when the film tells us, after a succession of Fandi travails, that he made it.

I asked Seavey afterwards why the film did not much emphasize (other than just showing him performing) the one area in  bullfighting where Fandi is recognized as exceptional among his peers, the tercio de banderillas -- where he is so spectacular that he has even (in my version of the storyline) discouraged others from doing it. Ah, that point just didn’t fit the story line they had -- or Antonio del Moral, the critic, didn't say it. Or something like that.

There is a second level to this film that seems to exist beyond the subtitles in the Spanish of the various  characters and seems to reveal them more deeply. It’s a subtle thing, maybe even my fantasy. We discover that Fandi doesn't particularly care for placing banderillas al violin, but he senses the public wants it. And he's driven to please. We see the story of Fandi’s brother, who has sublimated his own ambitions in life to be a mozo for his brother -- but he’s driven to be loyal to his family. There is also the contrast between his first manager and mentor, who always seemed to be a kind of a talker, an amusing smaller-time promoter, and his all-bottom line current manager. 

Really, there’s a ton of stuff to ponder, if you're so inclined.

Ultimately, the film tells us -- or is it Del Moral that takes on this duty -- that Fandi is not an “artistic” bullfighter.  I suppose some viewers might be left to wonder what “artistic” then means, since Fandi appears to be very successful.

Seavey concedes that he is “athletic” rather than artistic, so we are left with the dilemma of El Fandi that even Mario Carrion and I have puzzled over in conversation various times. What is the missing element in his faenas, especially when every once in a while, he gives hints of having something more within him?

I know that some people think he wears the bull out in the tercio de banderillas, leaving less for the faena. And what can you do after you run a bull -- running backwards -- in a way that almost has temple and brings  the bull to a standstill, appropriate for a desplante?   You could kill right there, if it was allowed.

But Fandi is good with the cape (even  better on his knees), and he usually kills well. So what is it about his faenas?

My own  theory involves Fandi’s approach to almost everything. He’s not only athletic, but he takes on things in a rush, trying to do everything, sometimes doing so many things that it seems he hasn't finished one before he starts another. And in a way, you don't get to savor much in this approach. Fandi just seems to get itchy standing still. He wants to throw himself into the situation. (The great Miguelin was that way, too.).

Yes, Fandi is wonderfully athletic, gifted, as they say, but great art in bullfighting, the most profound moments, seem to have a  base in stillness that allows us to savor the details.

Somewhere in the film or DVD, someone even tells Fandi to slow down.

Nevertheless, I've always been very fond of El Fandi. He has enlivened many a cartel on otherwise tedious afternoons, and I never get the feeling, “Oh, this guy again.” In allowing this presentation of his life, he’s done the fiesta a huge long-term great favor.

Seavey noted in passing that the filmmakers did not shoot the scenes of PETA protesters. PETA gave them the footage, so you are left to wonder how much the “antis” actually intrude on Fandi’s life. I’d have to look at the film again to make a judgment. But there are times when the old axiom, “There are two sides to every story,”  distorts reality, like when there are three or four sides or when the second side is really a minor blip on the screen.

There was a solitary protester with a handwritten sign at last night’s showing in Washington. Seavey said she invited the woman in, but the woman apparently preferred her solitary vigil. When I left the theater, she was all alone in the dark.

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