The Child

Every Thursday, Nicasio climbs up to the cemetery in Ortuella to visit his grandson's grave. That's the man at the heart of 'El niño', the 2024 novel by Fernando Aramburu, the author of 'Patria', and 'The Child' is Mariano Barroso's adaptation of it. The family is invented, but the loss is built on a real tragedy: on 23 October 1980 a gas explosion tore through a school in this Basque town and killed about fifty children and three adults.

Mariaje (Belén Cuesta) lost her son, Nuco, that day. Her father, Nicasio (Karra Elejalde), lost his grandson. They carry the same grief but don't live it the same way: while she tries to rebuild her life, he refuses to accept what happened.

Rather than the explosion itself, the film is interested in what came after: mourning, family ties and the different ways people face a loss like this. "Only when you're exposed to an extreme situation, and to the need to overcome it, do you discover your real strength," Barroso says. For him the story is about finding what's indestructible in us.

Pep Ambròs, Raquel Ferri, Leyre Berrocal, Joan Solé and young Alex Infantes complete the cast. The shoot moved through several Basque locations before wrapping in Madrid on 30 June 2025. Barroso produced it for Netflix with Rafael Portela, and it's his first film as a director in thirteen years, since 'Todas las mujeres' won him the Goya for best adapted screenplay.

It opens in Spanish cinemas on 13 November 2026 and reaches Netflix two weeks later, on 27 November. Aramburu has said the children who died in Ortuella deserve a dignified place in our memory.