The Controversy of the Platform
When this documentary premiered at the Gijón Film Festival, it sparked a massive backlash in Spain. The core of the debate wasn't about the quality of the filmmaking, but whether a man like Josu Ternera—a leader of ETA responsible for hundreds of deaths—should be allowed to tell his story on a platform as large as Netflix.
Interviewer Jordi Évole is a heavy hitter in Spanish journalism, and he doesn't go easy on Ternera. He brings up specific victims and forces the former leader to confront the human cost of his 'revolutionary' goals. However, Ternera remains largely defiant, using the bureaucratic language of conflict to distance himself from the blood on his hands.
Why Context Matters
If you sit a kid down to watch this without explaining who ETA was or the history of the Basque Country, they're going to be lost. The film assumes you know about the 1987 Zaragoza barracks bombing and the decades of tension under the Franco regime. It’s a great companion piece to the HBO series Patria, which covers the same conflict from a fictionalized, more emotional perspective.
This is 'educational' media in the sense that it shows how people radicalize and how they live with their choices decades later. It’s a stark reminder that history isn't just dates on a page—it's made of people making horrific decisions for what they believe are the right reasons.
