‘Old sins cast long shadows,’ says an English proverb. The novel The Long Shadows that Elía Barceló published 15 years ago and which has served as inspiration for the series of the same name that today comes to Disney pivoted on this idea. Directed by Catalan Clara Roquet, whose debut film Libertad won two Goya Awards (including novel direction) and four Gaudí Awards (including film), the series is presented as a female thriller that reflects on the weight of guilt and how it evolves. friendship over the years.
The series follows a group of women whose stable lives in Elda (Alicante) are shaken when the mortal remains of Mati, a high school classmate who disappeared during the end-of-year trip to Mallorca, appear. After 25 years, none of them have been able to forget that mysterious disappearance that the police considered voluntary. Elena Anaya, Belén Cuesta, Irene Escolar, Marta Etura, Itziar Atienza, Ana Rayo and Lorena López lead a predominantly female cast.
“You never stop being the person you were before and the traumas that you did not resolve in the past, you drag them along until at some point they will reappear,” Roquet advances in conversation with La Vanguardia. The series uses the genre of thriller and whodunit (who did it?) as a narrative excuse to talk, above all, “about characters with many layers and very complex themes such as family inheritance, the atmosphere of a small town, prejudices, how others see you and how you see yourself or how to live together after being a victim of abuse.”
Roquet defends that the thriller has no gender and that what changes "is that if its protagonists are women, it allows there to be themes that if they are men would not be there and that the way to resolve conflicts has to do with talking and not with more methods." violent.”
The spirit of the series is perfectly reflected in that proverb that gives its name to the book and the series. "What happened in the past, if you don't put light on it, you will continue to drag it and it will cast a shadow on your present," continues the director, who advances that Mati's disappearance will be the trigger for all the protagonists to see it rise to the surface. all the traumas that have been buried for years in the personal backpack of each of them.
Another phrase that one of the protagonists throws out, and that also defines the series, is “we are a consequence of our decisions, especially the bad ones.” For Roquet, these bad decisions “end up unconsciously affecting your life and defining your identity much more than you think,” says the filmmaker. And she gives the example of the case of Rita (Anaya), “who fled to London but later realizes that she is still trapped in that place of the unresolved past.”
The filmmaker would like that after watching the six episodes, “the viewer would be left with the idea of complexity, that in the end no one is just an executioner or a victim, that everyone is a victim before they harm another person; “A collective reflection is necessary on how society has reached this point.” She also trusts that the series will manage to convey the message that “the way to heal things and get ghosts out of the closet is to shine a light on them and talk about them.”
