If the rules were different, The Snow Society could have been a candidate for many of the Gaudí awards that are being awarded tonight. But due to regulations, Juan Antonio Bayona’s film was only eligible for the award for best European film and, as expected, it won.
“Many people ask me why we are not nominated in more categories,” said the director, who collected the award accompanied by part of the film’s cast.
But he has not delved further into the matter and has thanked Netflix for “making such a difficult film possible” and above all “the public for their incredible reaction, because it is amazing that The Snow Society is present in the conversations of the bars”.
The statutes of the Catalan Cinema Academy establish that only films that have at least 20% Catalan production and that also have Catalan professionals among their technical team can compete for these awards. The Snow Society meets the second of the requirements, but not the first, because it is a Netflix production.
Bayona may not have been a prophet in his homeland, but that does not detract from his film, which has become one of the hits of the season and has two Oscar nominations for Best International Film and Best Makeup and Hairstyling.
The recreation of the true story of the accident in the Andes of flight 571 of the Uruguayan Air Force chartered to take a rugby team to Chile in 1972 has become a critical and public success and has already received more than 51 million views on Netflix.
And The Snow Society is a story of overcoming and survival. That of 16 boys barely 20 years old who were trapped in one of the most inaccessible and hostile environments on the planet and were forced to resort to extreme measures to stay alive. The ordeal lasted 72 eternal days until December 23 when they were finally rescued.