Audiovisual production in Catalan has taken a great leap forward in its clear commitment to promoting content in both films and series. The Department of Culture has tripled the resources allocated to audiovisuals in the Catalan language since 2020. If 9.9 million euros were allocated that year, in 2023 the figure reaches 32.6. “A titanic effort that has been possible thanks to the commitment of the Government and the budget in the field of the country’s cultural policy,” said the president of the Generalitat, Pere Aragonès, in a joint press conference with the councilor Natàlia Garriga this year. noon at the Palau de la Generalitat.
“From the Government we are opening a new stage in the country’s linguistic policy, more ambitious than ever, to advance in the full normalization of Catalan,” commented the president, who has insisted on the key role that the school plays for learning. from Catalan. As well as the promotion of audiovisuals in Catalan, which “has been forgotten for too long.”
In the words of the president, the audiovisual sector in Catalan has to serve to “revalue its role as an engine of progress in the social use of the language and an engine of dissemination of our culture. Catalan has to be a language of communication, a language of use usual in the field of culture and especially audiovisual culture”.
The investments have been allocated, first of all, to the transformation and improvement of the Generalitat de Catalunya’s own means of communication. Secondly, aid for audiovisual productions in Catalan and thirdly in alliances with the large global audiovisual content platforms. In this sense, the collaboration with HBO Max has stood out, which has added 130 titles in Catalan in just half a year and in 2024 it will release new dubs of highly successful films.
“The audiovisual sector is a strategic sector for the future for the country and for the Government and we have seen it in other projects such as the Catalunya Media City, the digital culture center in the Antigua Foneria of Barcelona or the AINA project to incorporate Catalan. in the language of artificial intelligence”. And he concluded his speech by highlighting the path taken “which should serve to stimulate us to move forward more than ever.”
For her part, Natàlia Garriga has emphasized that “we want a strong cultural sector and the audiovisual sector is a priority because today everyone carries a screen and our language has to be within the content of that screen.” The Government’s action has focused on reinforcing three axes: aid for the production of films and series in Catalan, which has multiplied by six, going from 2.9 million (10 titles) in 2019 to 18.3 million in 2022 (29 titles). “Our intention is to have a minimum of four films each year with a budget that exceeds 2.7 million euros,” said Garriga.
Regarding series, of the 600,000 euros allocated to the production of fiction series in 2019, it has increased to 7.5 in 2022. Since that year, the original Catalan version has been a requirement to obtain aid for the production of fiction series. fiction. Such is the case of Això no és Suècia, directed by Aina Clotet, and released within the framework of the Serielizados Fest. Film releases and platforms are the other two axes that have been reinforced. Viewers who come to watch films in Catalan or dubbed remain at pre-pandemic levels. In 2022 there were twice as many viewers of films in Catalan (623,184) as in 2019 (309,793). These figures are largely due to the success of Alcarràs and titles such as Avatar 2 or Minions: L’origen de Gru. This year the most viewed movies are Barbie, Super Mario Bros.: The Movie, Indiana Jones and Elemental.
In a third way, the Culture strategy involves increasing the presence of titles in Catalan (dubbed or subtitled) on the platforms, which already have more than 3,000 audios and about 4,000 subtitles in the Catalan language. This increase is explained, to a large extent, by the collaboration between the Department of Culture and the Catalan Corporation of Mitjans Audiovisuals. Starting in 2024, HBO Max will premiere unreleased dubs of Warner blockbuster films such as Dune, Elvis, The Batman, Wonder Woman and Matrix Resurrections.
