Faura honours its former mayor shot by the Franco regime: film and theatre on 24 and 25 October
Faura, in the Camp de Morvedre district, offers free film and theatre on historical memory on 24 and 25 October. The film's director will talk with the audience and the town honours former mayor Lluís Ocaña, shot 86 years ago.
Faura, a municipality in the Camp de Morvedre district, has set aside Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 October for two events on democratic memory. Both are free, open to anyone and coincide with the 86th anniversary of the execution in Paterna of Lluís Ocaña Navarro, who was the town's mayor.
The first is on Saturday at 7 pm in the assembly hall of Faura Town Hall: a screening, in Valencian, of "La invasió dels bàrbars", directed by Vicent Monsonís. When the film ends, Monsonís himself will talk with the audience. It is a chance to ask him about a film centred on the silence imposed after Francoist repression and on the search for justice.
The script links two stories set eight decades apart. In 1939, a young conservative at the Prado Museum is questioned by a colonel of the Francoist army who wants to take a painting for himself. In the present day, her granddaughter tries to locate the mass grave where her grandmother may lie.
On the film's origins, Time Out reported in November 2025 that it is based on a 2020 stage play written by Chema Cardeña and performed at Sala Russafa, and that it was produced with À Punt, 3Cat and RTVE. According to the same publication, more than 200 extras took part in the shoot of the most complex scenes.
The date has a reason. Every 23 October, Faura remembers Lluís Ocaña Navarro, popularly known in the town as "tío Lluís". He was mayor and was shot by the Franco regime in Paterna; his remains were able to return to Faura in 2021. The municipality was also a stronghold of the left during the Republic and the Civil War, and suffered heavy repression in the post-war years, the historical background to this act of remembrance.
The mayor, Consol Duran, ties the commemoration to 31 October, the Day of Remembrance and Tribute to all Victims of the Military Coup, the War and the Dictatorship. She said the town hall will keep giving a voice to those victims so that their names are not erased from history.
On Sunday 25 at 8 pm it is the turn of theatre: the play "Allò que queda" is staged in front of the Escorxador (the former slaughterhouse) in Faura, on Carrer de Benavites. It is a collective creation within the "Fulles de Tardor" cycle, organised by the Hort Art company. It was first planned for the weekend of 17 and 18 October, but rain forced its cancellation.
The piece brings together a group of women from the villages of Les Valls. Through body and movement they explore the experience of those who must leave their homes and face an uncertain future. The play links the exile of the Spanish Civil War with the forced displacement still happening in today's conflicts, and focuses on women, many of whom make those journeys with their children in search of safety. Memory, loss, resistance and the passing of experience between generations are its themes.
The town hall invites residents of Faura and of the rest of the Camp de Morvedre district to attend both events, which carry no charge.
According to El Periódico de Aquí, with additional data from Wikipedia and Time Out.