The Night of the Sunflowers
The Night of the Sunflowers is a 2006 rural thriller-drama film directed and written by. The cast features Carmelo Gómez, Judith Diakhate, Celso Bugallo, Manuel Morón, Mariano Alameda, Vicente Romero and Walter Vidarte. It is a Spanish-French-Portuguese co-production.
Plot
Set in the village of Angosto, in the heart of rural Spain, the plot follows Esteban and Pedro and Gabi, as Cecilio, an elderly villager, is killed in the wake of a misunderstanding in the aftermath of the attempted sexual assault on Gabi by a salesman and ensuing violent confrontation.
Production
The Night of the Sunflowers is a Spain-Portugal-France co-production. Production companies included Alta Producción, Stop Line Films, The Film SAS and Arte France Cinéma. Locations in the province of Ávila doubled as the fictional village of Angosto.
Release
Distributed by Alta Films, the film was theatrically released in Spain on 25 August 2006. It also screened at the Venice Days section of the 63rd Venice International Film Festival in September 2006.
Reception
Jonathan Holland of Variety deemed the film to be a "gripping, assured debut", managing to find an "unlikely home for film noir in the forgotten hinterlands of the Spanish interior".