Spaniards may not crowd the streets by the tens of thousands to celebrate their auteurs the way they do their futbolistas, but there has been a palpable sense of exuberance in the industry this spring about a historic moment for Spanish cinema.

“I wish we lived it like that!” director Rodrigo Sorogoyen joked on the radio about the football analogy, after the April 9 announcement that his new film, The Beloved (El Ser Querido), would join Pedro Almodóvar’s Bitter Christmas (Amarga Navidad) and Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s La Bola Negra in an unprecedented three-film representation of Spain in this year’s Official Competition at Cannes.

“There’s a certain movement in Spanish cinema,” Festival Director Thierry Frémaux affirmed at the announcement, pointing also to the French release the previous day of Spanish director Carla Simón’s Romería, a 2025 Cannes competition title. “This country has continued to produce formidable artists.”

Spanish productions and co-productions can also be found in Un Certain Regard, Cannes Première, Special Screenings, Critics’ Week and Cannes Selection. The Croisette will be well stocked with the country’s most internationally renowned talents: Javier Bardem stars in The Beloved; Penélope Cruz and Glenn Close appear in La Bola Negra; and rising actress Victoria Luengo co-stars in both Beloved and Bitter Christmas, the latter alongside Barbara Lennie, Leonardo Sbaraglia, Aitana Sánchez-Gijón and Milena Smit.

“It speaks to the great moment Spanish cinema is experiencing,” Almodóvar said following the April announcement — and he should know. He has had a hand in launching many of these talents, and his El Deseo production house co-produced La Bola Negra as well as last year’s Cannes Jury Prize winner and double Oscar nominee Sirāt.

“It’s historical,” agrees Guillermo Farré, Head of Original Films & Spanish Cinema at Movistar Plus+, which co-produced Beloved, La Bola Negra and Sirāt and also backed Bitter Christmas. He notes that while Almodóvar has ensured Spanish cinema’s presence at Cannes at least every few years, this year’s three competition titles represent three different generations of filmmakers — proof, he says, that “Spanish cinema is in a very exceptional situation right now.”

Spain is “in vogue,” affirms Elisa Carbonell, CEO of Spanish foreign trade institute ICEX, pointing to the country’s heightened presence at international festivals, markets and awards shows. “We are capable of bringing together craftsmanship, which I think is a luxury now, and innovation.” Spain has proved its creativity, its originality and its reliability. “We are so successful because there is an industry and there is talent.”

“Where Talent Ignites”

That wider moment is captured in the new Where Talent Ignites campaign backed by ICEX’s Audiovisual from Spain initiative, premiering at Cannes. Rather than making claims about Spain’s creative industries, the campaign lets three new short films do the talking — each featuring established and emerging talents across different sectors.

“We wanted to make pieces that demonstrate what our industries are capable of,” Carbonell says. “The audiovisual is the common language that we’re using to talk about other industries, which are also key parts of the audiovisual sector.”

The first short, Flamenco, was unveiled in Rotterdam. Directed by Simón — who is also presiding over the Short Film and La Cinef Jury at Cannes — it features flamenco artists including Rocío Molina, Carmela Greco, Niño de Elche and Angeles Toledano. The second, La Tarara, turns its attention to Spain’s fashion sector. Directed by music video veteran Nicolás Méndez, it stars Ingrid García-Jonsson, Lennie, Rossy de Palma, Arón Piper and Eugenia Silva. The third, La Llama, is an animated short from the duo known as TURBO (Pau López and Gerardo del Hierro), highlighting contemporary designers including Jaime Hayon. All three will be available from May 17 at spainwheretalentignites.com.

“I think it’s a really beautiful initiative, to export that idea of the talent that exists, through stories — especially through short films, where we can empathize with the characters, get involved, and then reflect on what’s happening or what Spain is like,” says Simón. For Flamenco, she wanted to explore the “tension that exists between tradition and the contemporary” through a story revolving around mother and daughter flamenco artists — a theme that also feeds into her flamenco-focused feature film, currently in early development. “It seemed like a good opportunity to start working with people in that world and to try things out,” she says. “It’s been a huge learning experience… I’ve felt very much like a conductor.”

Signs of Good Health

This is the second and expanded edition of Where Talent Ignites, following a debut short in 2024 that was viewed more than 19,000 times. The business results are measurable in “international co-productions, financing agreements, more visibility among buyers and international producers… and the international platforms, which are actually increasing their investment in Spain due to the quality,” Carbonell notes.

They can also be measured in the sector exceeding the government’s target when it launched the well-funded Audiovisual Hub in 2021: a 30 percent increase in production by 2025. Spain produced 289 feature films (376 when including co-productions) in 2024 — a 6.6 percent year-on-year increase and the highest volume in the period 2013–2024, according to the Hub’s latest annual report.

Spain also led Europe for streaming commissions, accounting for 17 percent of the total, and was among the biggest beneficiaries of streaming investment in the region between 2015 and 2024, according to the European Audiovisual Observatory. “Competition in Spain is very, very strong, especially with the American streamers,” says Farré. “And the competition starts with the talent.”

The return of local audiences to cinemas is another indicator of health. Box office revenue almost doubled between 2021 and 2024, reaching €484.6 million ($568.5m) in 2024. Cinema attendance ranks fifth in Europe by revenue and fourth by audience numbers, with 760 cinemas and 3,562 screens holding steady.

“Spain is experiencing a great moment, where new and established talents intersect and all genres are being explored,” says Antonio Saura, managing director of sales house Latido Films. Local comedies remain the dominant force at the Spanish box office — led by Santiago Segura’s parenting franchise Father There Is Only One 5 — but local drama is performing well too, with Alejandro Amenábar’s The Captive and Alauda Ruiz de Azúa’s Sundays among the next top earners. “The Spanish box office for Spanish films is another matter entirely,” Saura adds. “It’s improved as well, but like in other countries, that’s largely thanks to local comedies.”

The Spanish Federation of Cinemas reported an 8 percent decline in overall moviegoers last year, but Spanish cinema maintained a healthy 19 percent market share.

Festival & Awards Bump

Spain’s auteur cinema is clearly traveling well, but Saura is candid that “the market is very complicated” for films without strong auteurs or marketing hooks. “In that sense, the support of a festival or a well-defined genre is essential.” He notes that Cannes interest is often buoyed by French sales agents and co-producers attached to Spanish films.

The festival effect is real. Ruiz de Azúa says Sundays benefited enormously from its Golden Shell win in San Sebastián. After taking five top Goya Awards in February, it was expanded to more theaters and saw a box office bump even after becoming available on Movistar Plus+. “As an independent production, we have fewer tools to give the film visibility,” she says. “Awards and festivals benefit all kinds of films, but specifically films that have fewer channels and fewer resources.”

Maria Martínez Bayona is premiering her debut feature The End of It in Cannes Première — a sci-fi story set in a future where aging and death are optional, in which a 250-year-old former artist decides she would like to die. The ambitious €8 million ($9.3 million) multi-country co-production, starring Rebecca Hall, Noomi Rapace and Gael García Bernal, took years to assemble. “It was quite a shock, finishing the film and then they called us and told us we were going to Cannes.”

For Farré, “Cannes has become the go-to place if you want to turn the launch of a movie into a cultural event.” Sirāt is his example: rather than releasing directly to Movistar’s platform, the film was given space to build an international career first. “We need the movies to have the space to connect with audiences and become relevant.” Sorogoyen’s The Beasts offers another template: after its Cannes Première, it swept the 2023 Goyas and earned a César for Best Foreign Film.

“The Envy of Europe”

While the Audiovisual Hub’s initial funds closed out in 2025, Carbonell says the money was spent “intelligently,” citing an estimated return of €9 per euro invested. She points to the new Spanish Technological Transformation Society (SETT) investment fund as the next vehicle for mobilizing capital and attracting foreign and private investment.

“Spain is the envy of Europe,” says Adrià Monés, CEO of Fasten Films, which co-produced three films from female directors at this year’s Cannes: Bayona’s The End of It; Laïla Marrakchi’s Spain-set immigrant tale La Más Dulce in Un Certain Regard; and Iranian director Pegah Ahangarani’s Rehearsals for a Revolution in Special Screenings. Monés points to Spain’s incentives, subsidies, platform investment, film school talent and strong technical crews as the pillars of what he calls “the perfect ecosystem, not too fragile despite all its problems.” He acknowledges that things could shift with changes in political support, but says the foundation is solid. “We’re attracting so many international productions to Spain, it’s very fertile ground for training young people. It’s a fabric, a foundation of growth.”

Carbonell agrees: “The audiovisual sector in Spain has transformed itself. Institutions understand that this is a key sector… I think we laid the base for something that’s going to scale, and we’re very happy.”