Director and writer Roberto Ruíz Céspedes tells us the dark story of a mother who loses her son named Stoyan (Max Ulloa), while the body of a young woman who has been strangled appears in another part of the same city. Parallel to this, there is Israel (Tristán Ulloa), a detective who investigates the murder of a young woman with a tree planted in her eye. Both events are united by the enormous power of a hidden society that has one purpose: to save Humanity from ignorance and attachment to the past, so that everyone can forgive themselves. Then Maika discovers that her son has been taken by a terrifying, ancient man to the Bardo, to the Beyond. Only by fulfilling certain conditions, those who have taken her son, return him to her. And she meets a mysterious woman named Ágata (Susana Hornos) who, from her own experience, tells her the only way to get Stoyan back: she has to go back to her past and forgive all the men who hurt her during her childhood. There are two stories that initially run along parallel paths and that will end up converging in the surprising ending. Thus all the characters will realize that, without knowing it, their lives will be linked by an invisible line or perhaps by a terrifying fantasy.
The film is about a desperate mother who tries to save her son from the men who kidnapped him. This event is related to the mother's journey to hell in search of her missing descendant. This situation runs parallel to the arduous investigation of a police inspector, all of which resulted in fateful consequences. The setting is quite good but I think the ending could be more shocking and clearer, in fact I did not understand the twisted and cryptic conclusion. The environment in which it is shot is acceptable enough but I think the ending could have been more attractive and clarifying, while the protagonist Marta Milans is a dazzling actress, she gave us dramatic feelings of the film with her successful performance, as well as Tristán Ulloa as the police detective who has dark secrets in his past.
This somewhat gloomy, claustrophobic, complex and exhausting too, as well as depressing, film was mediocrely written/directed and on a low budget by screenwriter Roberto Ruiz Céspedes himself. Film based on the award-winning short film "Broken Basket", starring Belén Rueda and Txema Blasco. ¨Stoyan¨ is a very strange, slow and weird film that unfolds along cryptic paths, and is very slowly narrated, turning out to be downright boring. This film reminds me a lot of another recently made one: "Asombrosa Elisa" (international title Amazing Elisa) by Sadrac González-Perellón, another bizarre film that boldly challenges the categorization of how to classify it. Thus 'Stoyan' is partly fantasy , thriller, relationship drama, Film Noir, fantasy, Science-Fiction and horror, an unconventional film mediocrely created in the twisted mind of writer and director Roberto Céspedes There are two stories that take place in strange atmospheres, accentuated by scenes of interior and exterior soberly illuminated by cameraman Kenneth Oribe and several sinister characters. Both fantastic stories are related to a powerful secret society whose purpose is to save humanity from ignorance and attachment to the past, so that everyone can end up forgiving themselves. There are some slightly well-known actors appearinh here and there: Paulina Gálvez, Marta Milans, Mariano Venancio, Natalia Rodríguez, Jimmy Shaw, and special mention for Tristán Ulloa as the police inspector who expertly directs the investigation of this and other similar murders, becoming involved in the twisted events; In addition, his real son Max Ulloa shows up in the title role Sayoran, and José Coronado's own son: Nicolás Coronado, all of them providing acceptable but forced performances, taking charge of meaningless and sometimes absurd dialogue. However, their passable performances are wasted by the ridiculous plot, so the film suffers from a profound error in not explaining the dark events in the clearest way, all of which plunges the story into the abyss. This offbeat film takes place in two different directions that ultimately come together to a mysterious ending.
It contains adequate cinematography as well as a somewhat suspenseful musical score in New Age style. This rare and enigmatic film was directed slowly and strangely by Roberto Ruiz Céspedes who uses a disjointed narration, sometimes being exhausting due to its slow pace, although a poetic aesthetic makes it attractive at times. The film won several awards and nominations, such as: Boston Independent Film Festival Roberto Ruiz Céspedes, 2022 Independent Spirit Award Winner, Tristán Ulloa, 2022 Independent Spirit Award Winner; Almería International Film Festival Roberto Ruiz Céspedes 2022 FICAL nominee for best first film; International Film Festival of the Five Continents Kenneth Oribe Winner Best Feature Film of Photography, Winner Best Production, Feature Film Miguel Ángel Poveda, among others. Roberto Ruiz is a Spanish film director, assistant director and film writer, and quite an award winner. He has made several short films, and some feature films, without much success, such as: ¨I was always Alex, Negativa, The legend of the Hindu rabbit, Gorillas de bien gente, Nieves (A Story of Love), Verbasco (Molène), Whiskey? ¨, among others . Score: 4.5/10. Below average.
