Imagine I Know What You Did Last Summer shorn of its cinematic horror conventions and set in more or less the real world where people live and act normally. You might get something close to The Hanged Man, where two close teenage friends and schoolmates end up killing a common criminal (twice!), hide his body, and spend the rest of the film slowly driving each other mad worrying whether he’s really dead and whether someone will find his body. This being a Spanish arthouse project, the thriller element takes a close second place at times to the themes of the protagonists’ coming of age and sexual discovery.

For director Manuel Gómez Pereira, this film is as different as he can make after a lifetime of making genial comedies for the Spanish market and an understandably long hiatus from film-making. As a comeback project, The Hanged Man is a daring and refreshing film that takes so many risks with its story and execution. Very few directors would dare make a film that starts off with a violent rape by a criminal, only to have morph it into a celebration of sexual discovery and lust in his victims, and then close the loop by unearthing the madness that obsession and fear can engender. Not only does the execution match up to the demands of the film’s premise, but the art direction is superb and beautifully haunting as well.

The Hanged Man premiered at the Goya Awards in late 2008 and has been making the film festival market rounds for two years. The wait is more than worth it.