Sara Gutierrez Galve is a Spanish filmmaker, born in Barcelona in 1994. She completed her first feature at the age of just 24: The Nights She Moves tells the story of two best friends living together yet never fully exploring their bond. The film was premiered in 2018, and it’s now back seven years later exclusively for you to watch.
The Night She Moves has been selected to the 10th edition of the ArteKino online film festival, and it is available to stream for free during the entire month of December 2025.
Click here in order to watch The Night She Moves now.
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Victoria Luxford – What inspired the idea for the film?
Sara Gutierrez – What drives the film is the exploration of a friendship and also a night-time journey. In a way, it was what belonged to us at that moment: friendship and the night. As for the friendship, I wanted to portray a pair of friends through their daily coexistence, where the boundaries between a friendship and a romantic relationship become blurred because the intimacy between them is so strong. And at the same time, how this friendship somehow takes second place when faced with a romantic relationship. The idea was that, in response to this conflict between the two friends, there would be a late-night escape that would lead us into a nocturnal adventure – an escape by the main character into the night, into a series of situations and unknown characters. In that sense, I was thinking a lot about Frances Ha for the daytime, friendship aspect, and After Hours for the nocturnal escape.
VL – The film has so much subtext beneath the dialogue, how difficult was it to convey that in the script?
SG – Actually the script barely had any dialogue. We wrote around 40 pages in the form of a treatment that laid out the conflicts in each sequence, the elements that needed to be at play, and it did present all the key moments of the story. But the dialogue, especially in the scenes between Max and Emma, were built during rehearsals and through improvisations. The nighttime section does have much more dialogue; I think that, in a way, Núria Roura (co-writer) and I gradually developed a taste for working on dialogue.
In any case, the script of The Night She Moves was only a guide. Since the film was financed outside the industry, we didn’t have to present a “conventional” script to funders, so the script was always a very living internal working tool that we were able to develop, in some sense, along the way.
VL – Max is such a key part of what ties the film together, how long did it take to find the right actor for the role?
SG – I don’t remember how long it took us to find him, but the casting process wasn’t very long – three months, maybe? I met Dani Casellas in my first or second year of university, years before I even started thinking about The Night She Moves. I saw him alone at a cinema and went over to say hello, we exchanged numbers, and it was years later, when we began casting, that I remembered him and called him in. And it worked really well. Núria and I met up with him some nights, went out partying, watched him interacting with strangers, and he had this mix of distance and closeness that I found very beautiful and very human. The Max we had written was just a guide, and Dani brought him to life – he gave us so much. We rewrote many things with him in mind, and later with Laia as well. He was very generous, they both were.
VL – Equally, his relationship with Emma has so many layers to it, did you hold chemistry reads before casting? How long did it take to find the right mix in Dani Casellas and Laia Vidal?
SG – When we decided that Dani would play Max, we asked him to introduce us to some of his female friends. And in fact, I think the first one we met was Laia Vidal. And it was instantly clear to us. We started filming them, doing their own things – talking, cutting each other’s hair. They had lived together, and you could feel it. Laia had a tougher edge than he did, at least on the surface. I believe Laia had never acted before, and she wasn’t particularly keen on the idea of making a film, but he managed to convince her. It was wonderful because she didn’t give any importance to the fact that she was in a film, and she did it so well.
VL – How difficult was it finding and shooting in the various locations for the film?
SG – It was tiring for the crew, I imagine, especially because we were shooting a lot at night. At the same time, most of the locations were places that friends and acquaintances lent us. The apartment was my place, to begin with. The painter’s studio where Max is painted was Peter Churcher’s studio, where Dani Casellas worked as a model. We knew the Barcelona exteriors well, and we spent a few nights going out to scout them. And in most cases, we encountered very kind people who agreed, either for free or for a modest fee, to let a group of students spend a few hours shooting a self-funded film. I imagine these are things you can only do once.
VL – Was there anything you wanted to shoot that, for reasons of time or budget, you were unable to achieve?
SG – Yes and no. On the one hand, it’s a film that was shot very quickly. We had very little time in each location for budget reasons, and I would have liked to shoot longer in the karaoke bar or at the club – to have more time for coverage, to try different things in the performances. But everything I wanted to shoot did get shot. I started out doing production on fairly low-budget short films and music videos, and naturally I write with resources in mind. I write thinking about how difficult certain things will be to film, and although that might seem limiting, it allows me to focus on what’s important and not fill the film with costly elements that might not be necessary.
VL – One scene that was striking for me was when Max is in the takeaway restaurant, and he hears music from another culture about heartbreak. There’s such a natural tone to it, I was wondering how you achieved that on the day?
SG – Before shooting the scene, Dani had met Arslan Gujjar, I believe. Arslan is the man Max meets outside the kebab restaurant and who invites him in. I had known Arslan for years, and we had a lot of trust between us. The other two restaurant workers, Sallah and Ajad, were the restaurant’s actual staff. I had met them before and asked if they wanted to appear in the film. The four of them met each other for the first time on the day of shooting, and if it worked – if that naturalness and closeness came across – it’s because they are all especially warm and welcoming. The shooting of the scene unfolded just as it does in the story. And it was a scene conceived as a kind of hug. Food has that quality too; it can be a hug.
VL – How did audiences first react to the film? Was there anything that surprised you?
SG – I think they reacted very well. But in the end, it’s also a bit misleading, because you go to a screening and everyone is enthusiastic (some of the audience might be friends or family, perhaps) and it feels like everyone loves the film. My grandmother didn’t quite understand the relationship between Max and Emma. My father called me the next day and said it was good, but that he expected more. Those were honest reactions. Recently, I presented The Night She Moves in Rome, and three men around 60 were devastated by the film – they said it seemed like a very sad portrayal of a lost generation. But then I’ve also met people around 60 who really identified with Max and who have experienced relationships very similar to the one Max and Emma have. Overall, though, I think the reactions have been very positive.
VL – Seven years on from the film’s release, how do you look back on your work?
SG – It was beautiful because I watched The Night She Moves again a few weeks ago, and for the first time I could see the film almost as I were discovering it for the first time. I noticed small production errors, like microphones or stuff like that, which made me laugh and feel a bit embarrassed, but it felt tender. I really enjoyed experiencing the journey. I’m currently writing my second feature, and watching Yo la busco made me reconnect with intuition, with desire, with writing from a place of freedom, just for pleasure and for fun – I didn’t expect it, and I think it was the best thing that could have happened. This film will always awaken a lot of tenderness, emotion, and gratitude. I think about the crew who gave their all, dedicating so many unpaid hours; I think about myself 7 or 8 years ago, my mistakes and right decisions; I think about my flatmate at the time who also worked on the film, and how we had to share a bed because the apartment was completely filled with shooting equipment.
VL – How difficult is it today to get an independent film in front of audiences, with distributors and streaming platforms becoming increasingly risk-averse?
SG – I’m still not entirely sure because that film was very small and yet it managed to reach far more places than we expected. Now, as we’re writing a bigger film, I think we will run into this problem. We’re still writing it, but we can already feel that they’ll ask for certain elements to minimize risks, like the need to work with known actors, for example. It doesn’t look too promising, but I’ll tell you more in a few years.
VL – The film ends with a conclusion, but perhaps some unanswered questions as Emma expresses doubt over leaving. Have you ever thought about where she and Max might be in the future?
SG – At some point, we considered writing a “one year later” scene, to see how all the friends were getting together for lunch. I didn’t want to because I wanted it to be a film that happens over the course of one day and one night, but I could picture them well, having put things in order without having to talk about them. I know that what Max should do is find another flatmate, that’s clear. And I think that in the end, whether by choice or pushed by the system (the boundaries between one and the other are always blurry), he would end up leading a more settled life, find a steady job, meet someone, take out a mortgage, and be okay. At the same time, he and Emma would never have that beautiful relationship they had while living together again, because maybe some things are meant to happen only at a specific moment.
VL –Finally, do you have any future projects that you are working on?
SG – Yes!!! Núria Roura and I are writing a second feature. In fact, ever since we finished The Night She Moves, we started writing, like “okay, what’s next?” And now we’re finishing the script and about to start financing. It’s an ensemble film, with several characters. I think with Yo la busco there was already this desire to enter the homes of different characters, like opening doors. And what we’re writing now is exactly that. This time it takes place in a village. A place similar to where I grew up, towns that are normal, neither small nor big, where it seems like nothing happens but actually things do happen. There will be lots of music, cakes, and a wedding. It talks about life’s expectations and disappointments. And it’s a comedy, I think.
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Sara Gutierrez is pictured at the top of this interview. The other image is a still from The Night She Moves.
