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A shepherd disappears from a small village in the rural province of Cuenca. Charges are trumped up by a local right-wing politician and an ambitious district judge. The Guardia Civil rounds up two local and unruly recalcitrant
troublemakers. The Guardia Civil ‘do their duty' and extract confessions from the accused miscreants in order to determine what they have done to the shepherds body after supposedly robbing him.
These torture scenes are realistically
acted out and are not for the squeamish. They are, however, integral to the plot.
"A startling, beautifully filmed and superbly acted picture by woman director, Pilar Miro, this is a memorable account of political conniving and the miscarriage of justice in the Spain of 1913. The acting throughout is of a high order, with star performances by the two accused, Daniel Dicenta and Jose Manuel Cervino, who are new to Spanish screens, and topnotch supporting roles by Fernando Pley, Hector Alterio, Amparo Soler Leal and others. Garcia Abril's score is spell-binding and direction and editing imaginative."
Peter Besas Variety