Autolytic attempts, wine, blood… and the harshness of rural Andalusia in the seventies. Here are some of the ingredients Expectation, the latest film by F. Javier Gutierrez. The previous one was third part of the franchise Ring for Paramount Pictures, which debuted at number two at the US box office, grossing $83 million worldwide.

IN Expectation, which hits theaters this Friday, December 15, Eladio, a farm guard, accepts a bribe from a hunter. A few weeks later, his whole life collapses. What seemed like a favorable turn of fate turns out to be terrible descent into hell in which the protagonist will see his sanity tested.

This is the starting point of the feature film, which represents the reunion of the director with Victor Clavijo after 3 days. In an interview with Independent Having filmed in one of the halls of the “Ideal Cinema,” Clavijo recalls that he had no doubt that he would blindly accept the role because of his blind trust in the director.

When he finally read the script, he wondered what they saw in it to bring the complex Eladio to life, but he remained captivated by the project. “I didn’t play any character that was so rural, they were all quite urban, even if they were from that period. Javi warned me about this. the film would be small and much more complex than 3 days. “I told him, ‘This can’t be true,’ but he was right,” he adds.

IN Expectation We see him deal with the sudden deaths of several people close to him, the hardships of being underclass in an extremely hostile environmentwhich seems to be a curse and even a transformation into a boar, and all this in a typically male character who barely expresses his feelings in words, although anger and sadness fill his eyes.

To bring this character to life, A man from Algeciras had to lose 7 kilogramsalthough this was not the only difficulty of the job: like other actors of Evan Peters’ style, the actor was influenced by the seriousness of the character.

“I don’t want to sound like a Hollywood star, but I’m filming a series in Seville and, interestingly, he shares technical staff with Expectation. A couple of weeks ago I was told that during filming I didn’t answer for Victorbut as for Eladio, I didn’t know about it,” he explains.

“When you finish a film, you experience shock for a while: your head knows what you’re doing, but your body doesn’t understand it, it lives as if it really happened.”

Victor Clavijo

For the translator, this has to do with the concentration required for the film. “He had to be kept as pressure cooker all the timeeven on any plane in which there was no a priori whether a character has an emotional breakdown or a big emotional peak, we wanted the emotion to be there all the time,” he notes. As for how he conveys it, he explains how he decided to focus on the emotion and let it “I don’t think that when I look left or right, I know that if the emotion is genuine, the camera will reflect it through my gaze, because the camera’s gaze is like an x-ray, it does not deceive.” “, he reflects.

The grueling shoot lasted four weeks, while the Andalusian took twice as long. This resulted in many sequences They will record in one take.. As if this were not enough, the fact that it has so many exteriors complicated the process, carried out in Cantillana (Seville) and in August due to the need for natural light and optimal conditions.

Clavijo notes that even on weekends, he found it difficult to completely switch off. “There is a part of you that is connected to the character all the time. You don’t lose your mind, but even though The head knows that you are playing, the body does not understand this. and lives it as something real. It’s hard to change chip at the end of filming and saying, ‘I’m happy,’ if it had gone on for months, it would have caused anxiety.”

There is something special about the film. 40 minutes without almost imperceptible dialogue the viewer has something to do with the careful sound of Zeltia Montes (Purple Network and let no one sleep) and a photograph signed Miguel Angel Morawho, in addition to working with F. Javier Gutierrez on other projects, also collaborated on the series Tell me how it happened.

“For me, the final packaging is another demonstration of Xavi’s talent. I saw some shots on the monitor, but it was difficult for me to understand how everything would look and the air that they were going to breathe in the film, also knowing what the pace was. Zeltia’s job was very difficult because she was constantly supporting without bright and melodic music, but rather in the background”.

“A look is like an x-ray for a camera”

The film is set in Andalusia and features characters with local accents among the films that put the autonomous community on the map, creating a time when Actors from the south of Spain hid their accents without the film’s plot justifying it.

“The fact that they allow us to work with an accent and move away from the Andalusian cliché, Galician cliché or Catalan cliché I like it. I love watching Catalan films in Catalan, I love watching Galician films in Galician… and what can I tell you about Basque cinema, I love watching it in Basque and I have no idea about the Basque language. This country has enormous wealth, as well as its myths and legends, and is an incredible area to explore. There is a lot of peace outside Madrid,” he defends

Ahead of the premiere and after receiving very positive reviews, he seems calm: “We know we have a good product, I think so. ever since I saw the movie and realized it was different and the critics confirmed it, it made me realize that I’m not a freak. I’m trying to take the pressure off the box office now, but I hope a lot of people will see it starting Friday and it will surprise them,” he concludes.