Stories of Migration and Solitude: A Portrayal of Spanish Society before and after the Economic Crisis in the Work of Icíar Bollaín

Abstract

An analysis of the bidirectionality of Spanish diasporic fluxes over the last twenty years is especially relevant for any approach to contemporary cultural fictions. In order to do so, this article analyses Flores de otro mundo and En tierra extraña, a fiction film and a documentary by Icíar Bollaín. Both texts form part of a new wave of continental cinema that questions the myth of multiculturalism in the European Union. Through them, Bollaín explores the intricacies of Spanish society before and after the economic crisis of the beginning of the twenty-first century. If Flores de otro mundo represents Spain as a hostile ‘diaspora space’, En tierra extraña centres on the subaltern experience of a young generation of Spaniards who are still looking for their place in the world. As this analysis will show, Bollaín’s works challenge national and ethnocentric traditions while approaching the drama of (im/e)migration in contemporary Europe.