News

Spain’s TV market saw 82 new fiction series commissions over September 2022 to August 2023, 61% of them aimed at exclusive online release, compared to 52% the year before, according to TV research firm The Wit.

A few years ago, online was an afterthought. Now, to various degrees and in different ways, it is replacing linear as operators’ major concern.“Linear operators are refocusing their productions with the perspective of reaching a younger audience,” says the Wit’s Caroline Servy.

The clout of platforms within the industry has progressed very quickly.Atresplayer, the platform run by leading broadcaster Atresmedia, has increasingly become an energetic driver behind the local TV production sector since its 2013 launch. Public broadcaster Rtve is venturing into co-production as it has committed to provide exclusive and original content to its Rtve Play platform.

On Aug. 1, Movistar Plus, Telefónica’s pay TV/VOD operator, bowed a new souped-up version of its basic tier as a streaming service.

Carlos Garde, director of Onza Distribution from 2019, has been promoted to Onza general manager as part of what Onza, producer of “The Department of Time,” “Little Coincidences” and “Parot,” describes as a further phase of expansion at the Spanish production-distribution house.

Details of Garde’s new role come as Onza has also unveiled its lineup for next week’s new Miami-based market, Content Americas,

In its biggest move to date, in the run-up to 2021’s NATPE, Onza announced Onza Americas, a Miami beach-head for expansion into Latin America and the U.S. Latino market.

In his new role, Garde will work with Onza CEO to further growth in these territories. Beatriz Nouh, a former sales manager for Europa at The Mediapro Studio Distribution, has meanwhile been tapped as head of sales at Onza Distribution.

Carlos Rodríguez, ex-senior legal and compliance counsel at NBC Universal, has joined Onza’s legal & business affairs department.

In a move that suggests the golden age of true-crime content is also being established in Spain, Madrid-based Onza Distribution has pounced on worldwide rights outside the country to smash hit series “Crímenes” (“Crimes”), by Catalan journalist Carles Porta.

Broadcast since 2020 on Catalunya’s public broadcaster TV3 under the Catalan title of “Crims,” the true-crime series’ first two-seasons topped free-to-air TV primetime slots in the region, snagging peaks of 22 audience share.

Since January, adapted as “Crímenes” into Spanish language, it launched nationwide on leading paybox Movistar Plus’ premium channel #0 and its VOD service, also generating an enthusiastic audience response.

Onza Distribution is presenting “Crimes” to international buyers for the first time ever at MipTV, which runs April, 4-6 in Cannes.

With the combination of documentary material and the necessary fictional resources, “Crimes” recounts a series of criminal offenses extracted from recent real-life events in Spain.

It invites the viewer to...

Exclusive: Italian company picked up rights from Spanish outfit Deaplaneta.

Spanish outfit Deaplaneta has closed a deal for remake rights of its romcom Off Course (Perdiendo El Norte) with Cattleya for Italy.

Deaplaneta also confirmed sales on its youth comedy The Misfits Club to France (Family Films) and Italy (Mediaset).

Here at the Efm, the company has been holding its first market screenings of sic-fi drama, Second Origin, directed by the late Bigas Luna and Carles Porta.

If you haven't already heard of this adaptation of Manuel de Pedrolo's 1974 alien apocalypse novel, "Second Origin Typescript" (Mecanoscrit del segon origen), shame on you, because we've been writing about the film since 2009. There, now that you've been sufficiently scolded, we can get on with some background.

"Second Origin Typescript" is one of bestselling Catalan novels ever and is considered something of a masterpiece. The movie adaptation, called simply Second Origin, has obviously taken years to come to life and is directed by Carles Porta and was co-written by Bigas Luna and Ross Jameson.

Synopsis:

A white girl Alba (1 [Continued ...]...

Cake

Jennifer Aniston is set to star in Daniel Barnz's "Cake" for Cinelou Films. Patrick Tobin penned the script.

Aniston plays a woman who becomes fascinated by the suicide of a woman in her chronic pain support group. [Source: THR]

Second Origin

Rachel Hurd-Wood is set to star in Carles Porta's sci-fi romance "Second Origin". A seven week shoot begins in Spain on February 17th.

Set in a post-apocalyptic world, the story follows two young people struggling to survive in a world left in ruins. [Source: Screen]

The Hero

Famke Janssen is set to star in the Dutch thriller "The Hero". Janssen's sister Antoinette Beumer directs while her other sister Marjolein Beumer penned the script.

Based on the novel by Jessica Durlacher, the story follows a Holocaust survivor who seeks revenge after masked men break into her house and shoot her husband and she is assaulted in the woods. [Source: Screen]

NCIS: New Orleans...

Sci-fi romance was originally slated to be directed by the late Spanish director Bigas Luna.

Rising British actress Rachel Hurd-Wood (Peter Pan, Perfume: The Story Of A Murderer) is to star in Second Origin, the new film that maverick Spanish director Bigas Luna was originally slated to direct.

Here at the Efm, Manifest Film Sales today announced the imminent start of production on the project.

Bigas Luna who sadly died during the pre-production, is still being billed as co-director. His friend, co-writer and director Carles Porta is now helming.

A science-fiction romance about love and adventure set in a post-apocalyptic world, Second Origin tells the story of Alba and Dídac two young people struggling to survive in a world left in ruins.

Based on the bestselling Catalan novel Mecanoscrit del Segon Origen by Manuel de Pedrolo, which has sold over 2m copies worldwide, Second Origin is a Spanish/UK co-production, produced by [link...