The project that ended up becoming this film originated from producer Eloy Lozano, who wanted to film Eduardo Blanco Amor's Galician-language book "A esmorga" in its original language and with a screenplay by Blanco Amor himself. The project ended up falling apart and Blanco Amor's screenplay was sold to Gonzalo Suárez, who partially rewrote it and directed it as this Spanish-language movie. Eduardo Blanco Amor, while retaining screenwriter credit in the finished film, was disappointed with the changes made to his story and claimed that he one day would like to see the book made into a Galician language film starring Galician actors. That finally happened with Ignacio Vilar's A esmorga (2014), though 35 years after Blanco Amor's death in 1979.