‘Rains Over Babel’: Rotterdam Review

Dir/scr. Gala del Sol. Columbia/USA/Spain. 2025. 111mins.

Drenched in neon, accessorised with fetish gear and steeped in extravagant queer Latin-punk attitude, Rains Over Babel is inspired by Dante’s Inferno but driven by the contradictions and rebellious spirit of the city of Cali, Colombia. The feature debut from Spanish-Colombian writer/director Gala del Sol, this is an eye-popping, sexually-charged journey which knits together the interlocking destinies of a group of gender-fluid misfits who congregate at a dive bar called Babel. Alighieri purists and students of 14th-century narrative poetry might question how much of the source material made it into this retro-futurist urban fantasy but, as a showcase for del Sol’s playfully iconoclastic vision, the picture fizzes with energy and mischief.

 Retro-futurist urban fantasy

Rains Over BabeI, which screens in Rotterdam’s Bright Futures after premiering at Sundance, should enjoy further exposure on the festival circuit. With a pop-punk aesthetic reminiscent of the work of Gregg Araki and a vivid queer-surreal flair that evokes the Rwandan sci-fi fantasy Neptune Frost, this is a title that should figure highly on the watch lists of LGBTQ+ programmers and, perhaps, specialist distributors.

The film’s main location, the hedonistic nightclub Babel, represents purgatory. Every night La Flaca (Saray Rebolledo), the extremely funky, flamboyantly manicured grim reaper, gambles the night away with desperate souls hoping to buy a little more time for themselves or loved ones. One who takes her chances with La Flaca’s loaded deck of cards is Uma (Celina Biurrun), who risks years of her own life to try and extend that of her seriously ill daughter. Uma joins forces with Timbi (Jose Mojica), the son of the club’s debt-ridden proprietor Gian Salai (John Alex Castillo), who fears for his own life at the hands of a pair of samba-loving gangsters.

Gian Salai’s fate rests upon a live performance by salsa orchestra La Mambanegra, led by the charismatic frontman El Callegüeso (Jacobo Vélez). Unfortunately, El Callegüeso has gone missing, and Uma and Timbi must gain access to My Petit Pony, a kind of themed fetish hotel/underworld, to locate him. Elsewhere, Jacob (William Hurtado), the seemingly straight-laced son of a pastor, is about to make his drag performance debut at Babel. His parents know nothing of his alter-ego, although his mother suspects that he’s keeping secrets when she spots his fishnet ankle socks. And then there’s Dante (Felipe Aguilar Rodríguez) who collects souls for La Flaca, but who has forgotten his own life and entered into a contract with death.

There is a lot going on, and not all of it makes a great deal of sense – Del Sol workshopped the screenplay for the film with a group of young actors, which perhaps explains the fact that it can feel a little overloaded with characters and subplots. But Del Sol ties the many disparate plot lines together with consistency in the film’s striking design and intriguingly eclectic music choices. A riot of scorching hot pinks and dissolute blues, with veins of neon tubing carving up the frame and graffiti daubed on every available surface, the film’s look is an emphatic statement. The costumes are equally distinctive, veering towards the peacocking new romantic end of the punk spectrum.

But the lifeblood of the film is the music, which takes in everything from vibrant salsa to trap, techno and flamenco; the latter performed in a gypsy bar by Kiko Rathore. The film’s climax, set against the concert by La Mambanegra, is a highlight, a wildly energetic and thrilling collision of sex, ecstasy and death.