Those holding the purse strings in Spanish film and TV must not “reject” ambitious projects or they could miss the next La Bola Negra or Sîrat, according to the influential former content chief at Movistar Plus+.
Domingo Corral whipped a partisan audience into something of a frenzy at the MIA Market in Rome yesterday when he passionately called on TV and film commissioners to do away with safety-first tendencies and embrace the spirit that he attempted to install at Movistar Plus+, the pay TV and streaming arm of Telefonica-owned Spanish telco Movistar.
Corral was joined on the MIA panel by Maria Zamora from Elastica Films, Belén Atienza from Suspense Entertainment and Fernando Bovaira from Mod Producciones, who all agreed that recent upticks at the Spanish box office could be attributed to ambitious but mainstream movies.
“Formulaic, conservative proposals will always be there, but you cannot reject the other way,” said Corral. Bovaira, who has produced films such as Agora and Vanilla Sky, added: “We need commissioners who are willing to go the casino and gamble.”
Recalling his strategy during his 11-year spell at Movistar, Corral added: “If there was ambition with the producer, we had to make sure the vision became a reality. We wanted vision and passion for something original, and the role of the commissioner was key. As an independent producer now, if you don’t have a strong commissioner who promotes the strategy, it’s very difficult.”
Corral and his team were axed from Movistar Plus+ last year, prompting an outcry from the creative community, who saw his outlook as the main preserve of ambitious but popular storytelling. His track record included La Bola Negra, which has just released in four screens in the U.S. to $278,000 ahead of its streaming launch.
Corral also greenlit Cannes title Sîrat from Oliver Laxe, Los Tigres from Alberto Rodríguez, Alauda Ruiz de Azúa’s Los Domingos, and Cinco Minutos Más, starring and written by Berto Romero and helmed by Javier Ruiz Calder.
Soon after news of his axing got out, Around 150 creatives, heavyweights Pedro Almodóvar, Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruzan, signed an open letter thanking Corral and his team for championing high-end original film and TV and asking for those efforts to continue and standards be maintained.
Movistar Plus+’s Head of Original Films & Spanish Cinema, Guillermo Farré, later told Deadline he was committed to staying the course on original Spanish films, but not everyone is convinced yet.
During the MIA panel, Zamora from Elastica, which is selling La Bola Negra, said: “When you want to make authors grow with you, it’s difficult to raise the funding you need for them to really perform internationally. We don’t know if Movistar will keep doing it. We hope they will.”
Corral was keen to push the concept of ‘quality mainstream,’ which is predicated on the idea that ambitious concepts will attract audiences on the strength of the content.
“When I was at Movistar Plus our obsession was how to be and how to stay relevant in a context where there are so many films and series that get made,” he said. “If you follow the algorithm it’s a surefire way of not being relevant, in my opinion.
“The strategy we followed may not work for everyone but it worked for us. We had three films in Cannes in three years, and we had the support of the entire industry and without the producers we could not have done it.”
Corral has since struck a production deal with HBO Max, and this week told Deadline why he believes his vision of ambition production aligns with that of Sarah Aubrey and Casey Bloys at the top of the merger Skydance commissioning tree. The debut show from the pact, about the disappearance of Spanish petty criminal El Nani, remains in development, Corral confirmed.
The MIA Market in Rome runs through Friday.