Dr Matt Hilborn

A high price toupee: The costs of baldness in Por los pelos - NECSUS by Matthew Hilborn

🥳 New publication! “A High Price Toupee: The Costs of Baldness in Por los pelos” is out in NECSUS (Autumn 2025, #Ageing). I explore how screen comedy frames baldness, masculinity & hair-loss anxiety via Spain’s Very Bald Trip (Nacho G. Velilla, 2022)

necsus-ejms.org/a-high-price...

Haha I know the feeling! Please let me know how it goes for you and if you found it valuable (and, if so how!) - thanks a million

7. El laberinto del fauno (Guillermo del Toro, 2006) (with Ann Davies)

🎬 New Podcast Episode - Pan's Labyrinth, with Professor Ann Davies, Emerita of Spanish at @stir.ac.uk!

For film fans and Spanish students/teachers!

🎧 open.spotify.com/episode/7Ky7...
#PansLabyrinth #GuillermoDelToro #FilmStudies #Podcast

Film Comedy and Spain: Humour, Genre, and the Nation 1970-2020 - Matthew Hilborn Modern Humanities Research Association - Film Comedy and Spain: Humour, Genre, and the Nation 1970-2020 - Matthew Hilborn

🎉 Buzzing from the launch of Film Comedy and Spain: Humour, Genre & the Nation 1970–2020! 🎉

Huge thanks to @ucdslcl.bsky.social for sponsoring and to everyone who joined - in person & online! 🙌 Honoured to receive the @hispanists-ahgbi.bsky.social Publication Prize!

Get yours👇
tinyurl.com/25s7vtph

Come along tomorrow @4pm!

My Book Launch is happening next Tuesday 25th! Please do come along if you can :) Hybrid option available - if you're interested, shoot me a quick email or write to me on here 📚

📢 My chapter is out in Feminismos e Humor! I analyse Javier Fesser's "Ayoub's birthday", from his Unfortunate Stories (2020) as a romcom gone wrong, inverting national myths to critique historical amnesia RE Spain's "de-Africanization".

Full ebook: €5!
tinyurl.com/56bhesuf
#SpanishFilm #FilmStudies

The paperback of Ophelia Through Time: Reimaginings in Art and Film (by Prof Carolina Sanabria, translated & edited by me, with a co-written Intro) is out now via Cambridge Scholars! 📖

£32.99 - or ask me nicely for a cheeky further discount 😉

Buy here: cambridgescholars.com/product/978-...

After a year online, our Convergence article is out in print!
We analysed how British film & TV circulate (and sometimes hide) on Europe’s VoD platforms.
Huge thanks to my co-authors @jeanettesteemers.bsky.social and Cathrin Bengesser! doi.org/10.1177/1354...

Yesterday UCD's Newman Building was transformed by 'Metamorphosis' - a giant inflatable sculpture by Olga Diego. Students & staff drew and performed on this reusable plastic canvas, turning art into a living act of sustainability. Kudos colleagues Ana Vera & Eva Bru-Domínguez! @ucdslcl.bsky.social

Tough Love: Violence and Revenge in Contemporary Spanish Romantic Comedy* This article analyses the trend of violent romantic comedies in Spain that, following the nation’s economic crisis (loosely 2018–2017), swap adoration for marital discord and divorce. Unlike screwb...

📣 Thrilled that my article "Tough Love: Violence and Revenge in Contemporary Spanish Comedy" is out in Bulletin of Spanish Visual Studies! I analyse a wave of cynical anti-romcoms - like new film The Roses (2025) - reflecting cynicism and waning couple confidence #filmstudies doi.org/10.1080/2474...

A pulsating panel on self-representing streaming services at ECREA 2025! I spoke about how Netflix Spain comedies about sex & intimacy incorporate Netflix itself into their own diegesis! #loveirishresearch

What an amazing panel on gender and the body in Spanish cinema at @acis46.bsky.social! Thanks to the organisers for such a stimulating conference 😍

Terrific first day of @acis46.bsky.social, sharing conversation and good food with Hispanists from right across the globe! And all in one of my favourite Spanish cities: Santiago de Compostela :)

Awesome! Yes, Duncan is an authority on all things Spanish cinema! I'm planning future episodes and guests now, so watch this space! Thanks for the interest in the pod :)

6. Fe de etarras (Borja Cobeaga, 2017) (with Alison Posey) Palomitas · Episode

NEW Palomitas episode on Fe de etarras (Bomb Scared) (2017)!

We dissect Borja Cobeaga's satire of 4 inept militants trapped in a flat during Spain's 2010 World Cup win ⚽️

With expert Alison Posey

Listen: tinyurl.com/4jt682cw

#PalomitasPodcast #CineEspañol #ETA #Spanishfilm

Haha I'd love to cover as many films as possible - but, alas, time is always the issue! If you'd like to come on the podcast to discuss one of those above, or another you deem particularly important/nuanced, it would be terrific to hold a conversation about it 😀 So far I'm focusing on Spanish cinema

Hi Pete! Thank you for this kind message - I'm so glad that it's come in handy for you and your students! If you have any requests for future episodes, please let me know 😀

📢 Delighted to announce that my book, "Film Comedy and Spain: Humour, Genre, and the Nation 1970-2020", is out!

Get your copy - or ask your library for one - here: www.mhra.org.uk/publications/Film-Comedy-Spain

Thanks to everyone who supported me through this process!

#NewBook #FilmStudies

New Pod!🎙️

Remember the Jenni Hermoso/Luis Rubiales "kiss"?

🎧 Palomitas explores feminist struggles in Spanish docs:
📽️ No estás sola (fighting the "Wolf Pack")
⚽ #SeAcabó (women’s football revolution)
Special guest Dr. Abigail Loxham @abigail
🔗 tinyurl.com/mr3vaz5x

#WomensFootball #MeToo #SeAcabó

So much of the discourse surrounding James Gunn's #Superman reminds me of his Spanish parody, #Superlópez (2018). Extracts from my new book, "Film Comedy and Spain: Humour, Genre, and the Nation 1970-2020"! #superheroes #filmstudies #newbook www.mhra.org.uk/publications...

🚩Wrapping up #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium! Thanks to the brilliant presenters, keynote Mary Harrod, our sponsors @baftss.bsky.social, @officialbaas.bsky.social, @kingsfilmstudies.bsky.social & all attendees! Special thanks to my co-organizers @victoriapistivsek.bsky.social & @sarahlahmtv.bsky.social ❤️

🚩Time for our keynote at the #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium! Mary Harrod @warwickfilmtv.bsky.social speaks on romance without ethics in the digital age

🚩Panel 4 - HAPPILY NEVER EVER AFTERS - of #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium twists our happy endings! Queer Qs & Saltburn (Anamarija Horvat) @northumbriauni.bsky.social, Killer Hit Man (Vernon Shetley) @wellesley.edu, Interracial romance (Zélie Asava), reinventing Bergman Island (@cinemariasf.bsky.social)

🚩Panel 3 of the #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium will give us a reality TV check! MAFS & hidden abuse? (Anna Dawson), Decoding lesbian toxicity? (@polinazelm.bsky.social & Ellie Smith) @warwickfilmtv.bsky.social @, Redeemable fboys? (@victoriapistivsek.bsky.social) @kingsfilmstudies.bsky.social

🚩Panel 2 of #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium - GENDERED TOXICITIES: Godrèche rediscovered (Catherine Fowler) @universityofotago.bsky.social, toxic motherhood (Lingjun Wang) @leedsunimedia.bsky.social, Ghosting & gaslighting (Martin Hall) @yorkstjohn.bsky.social, Teens, TikTok, & desire (Lorenza Parisi)

🚩Panel 1 of #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium - RED FLAG POLITICS - gets us right into the danger zone! Slaps vs slugs (Catherine Wheatley) @kingsfilmstudies.bsky.social, Gentrification in rom-com drag (Harriet Idle), Creep time (Louis Bayman), Tradwife Toxicity (Matthew Hilborn) @ucddublin.bsky.social

🚩The #SpottingRedFlagsSymposium kicks off today @kingscollegelondon.bsky.social! Stay tuned for live updates!
Organized by @victoriapistivsek.bsky.social & @sarahlahmtv.bsky.social & myself
Sponsored by @baftss.bsky.social & @officialbaas.bsky.social & @kingsfilmstudies.bsky.social

I was thrilled to launch my book "Film Comedy and Spain" - out next month! - at @humorsofias.bsky.social in Santiago!

The book interrogates Spanish film comedy as a contested site of national identity formation, tracing its evolution from late Francoism to the polarised present!
#FilmStudies

Jilly Kay kick us off at the "Reactionary Politics, Women, and Feminist Critique" symposium at @lborouniversity.bsky.social!