Film Movement has announced the impending release of Spanish director F. Javier Gutiérrez‘ (Before the Fall, Rings) dark and brooding folk horror thriller, The Wait (La espera).
The Wait tells a macabre tale set in the Andalusian countryside, offering a terrifying vision of calamity, loss, revenge, and class divides. The film centers on Eladio (Victor Clavijo – reuniting with Gutiérrez after working together on Before the Fall), who has been tasked with overseeing the sprawling hunting grounds of a wealthy Spanish landowner named Don Francisco. The estate is divided into ten hunting stands, spaced far enough apart to avoid incidents. However, Eladio’s steadfast commitment to his role is tested when Don Francisco’s second-in-command, Don Carlos, approaches him with a tempting offer to add three additional hunting stands to the property. Eladio initially hesitates, but his wife eventually convinces him to take the money. Eladio’s greed has unfortunate consequences that drag his entire family to perdition, and plunges him into the depths of guilt, hatred, and revenge.
Revealing his decision to take on this project, Gutiérrez said, “After Rings, I felt the need to return to Europe, to Spain, to Andalucía, and shoot something personal. As a good friend told me once, “one for them, one for me, for my soul”. The Wait belongs to the latter. No doubt, this film brings me back to my roots, my land, my memories, my most personal storytelling, along with my childhood nightmares. As I did in Before the Fall, beneath the story, I push the boundaries, to go deeper, through layers, symbols, exploring once again the complexity, darkness, beauty and weakness of our human nature. Death. Grief. Guilt… All disguised as a disturbing folk horror, brutal, uncompromised, with the soul of a western. That’s The Wait. A suffocating step towards the edge, into our inner fears. No answers. No mercy. Too harsh? Maybe. But you know, to see a candle’s light, one must take it into a dark place.”
The film also co-stars Ruth Díaz (The Occupant, “Locked Up”), Moisés Ruiz, Pedro Casablanc (“30 Coins”, “White Lines”), Antonio Estrada (Piety, “Wrong Side of the Tracks”), and Manuel Morón (Valley of the Dead, Cell 211) and is produced by Adrián Guerra, F. Javier Gutiérrez, and Antonio P. Pérez.
The film was also nominated for best motion picture as the Sitges Film Festival and audiences will be able to experience this brooding, potent tale when it premieres via VOD and digital on October 4, 2024.
