Jaime Rosales became one of the directors that every lover of Spanish cinema should follow after ‘The hours of the day’, his first feature film. Unfortunately, it may have even released some more commented films at the time of its release, but artistically none reached that level. In fact, with ‘headshot’ I was about to throw in the towel and leave his cinema aside.
Luckily, his latest works, without being round works, did manage to seduce me, since both ‘beautiful youth’ What ‘Petra’ They were pretty good movies. Now come back with ‘Wild Sunflowers’another proposal that mixes the social with the emotional that has his best asset in Anna Castillo. Too bad nothing else in the movie lives up to it.
fragments of life
Something evident in all of Rosales’ films is that has always shown a great interest in capturing reality with the camera, but always being aware that it is practically impossible to do so. That has always led him to make different decisions marked by the presence of her behind her, perhaps the most outstanding being everything related to the polivision that gave so much to talk about in ‘La Soledad’.
Here he tries again and the result oscillates between the elusive and the natural, the scene most marked by his camera work being one that could perfectly be used in any romantic story. I am referring to the first encounter between the characters of Castillo and Oriol Pla (‘The day of tomorrow’), as Rosales constantly moves from one character to another, thus playing with the power dynamics until it becomes clear that he has managed to cajole her, and it is inevitable that a romantic relationship will arise between the two. .
In this regard we had already been given an important clue when the character of Carolina Yuste She hadn’t believed a word of Castillo’s when he told her she was tired of the guys and wanted to stay away from them. Rosales clearly establishes through these elements that the protagonist of ‘Girasoles Salvajes’ is cannon fodder condemned to repeat the same mistakes over and over again.
The problem is that this message ends up becoming somewhat repetitive as the film footage progresses, thus gradually losing strength. It is true that in the third story there is a moment of great dramatic intensity that raises the film to the point of almost compensating for it, but in the end the same idea remains: ‘Wild Sunflowers’ goes as far as Castillo is able to take her.
And there it is impossible to fault the film, since Castillo has been making it clear for years that she is one of the most talented Spanish actresses, taking in ‘Girasoles Salvajes’ that dramatic range that she had already exhibited in ‘El olivo’, ‘Fourth to a Mother’s Journey’ either ‘Life was that’ to another level. And she does it both when Julia has to be hopeful and lively about her life and when she overcomes everything and bitterness, disappointment and pain eat everything up.
In addition, he achieves it with that naturalness that Rosales seeks at all times, thus making it clear that ‘Girasoles Salvajes’ is his film. It is true that there are times when their characters come to the fore, especially in the case of Plá, but the interest is much greater when Julia is the absolute protagonist, because even conventional or already seen situations feel fresh and close. With this I don’t want to criticize their work, especially that more physical tone of Plá’s, but it feels like that.
Unfortunately, Castillo brings a lot to the table, but there comes a point where ‘Wild Sunflowers’ begs for the focus to be more on her rather than through the men in her life. Even if it was just more scenes with her father (Manolo Solo) to be able to see her as she really is instead of how she adapts to other people, leaving behind a certain feeling of emptiness that is difficult to justify.
In short
‘Girasoles Salvajes’ is an estimable film with several noteworthy aspects, but in the end the idea prevails that Castillo shines with great intensity within an ecosystem in which everything else falls short. Nor is it one of those cases in which the protagonist embroiders it and the rest does not matterbut it is closer to that than to being an essential proposal.