Public Funding Backing a Film That Earned Just €66,896 in Two Days

Public Funding Backing a Film That Earned Just €66,896 in Two Days

One million euros in public money. Two days of release, theoretically the best. €66,896 earned and 9,676 viewers. That is the score for Te estoy amando locamente, the antiestéticature film directed by Alejandro Marín about the Andalusian LGBT movement of the 1970s, starring Alba Flores and financed in 2021 with aid from the Ministry of Culture. The cinema release did not happen.

On the same calendar, Vacaciones de verano, Santiago Segura's comedy, was the choice of 175,429 viewers and earned €1,151,276 in its first week. The comparison is tricky—one is a seasonal comedy and the other a thesis film—but the scale is imposing.

What the Opening Weekend Box Office Reveals

Two days usually decide the fate of a Spanish release. If the theater is empty during that period, distributors cut copies and the film fades away. Here, the start left 9,676 tickets sold, just over 4,800 per day.

No one disputes that art-house cinema does not fill cinemas: it is an old and proven fact. The problem starts when that cinema is paid for with everyone's money and then sold as a cultural success without passing through the market.

Institutional Support That Did Not Reach Theaters

The Secretary of State for Equality, Ángela Rodríguez Pam, shared the film's trailer expressing her "desire" to see it. This is no minor gesture: it places a ministry in the promotion of a specific cultural product. Institutional support, however, did not spread. That desire was not shared by the public.

It is worth remembering the architecture of the case: one million euros from Culture to produce and an institutional megaphone from Equality to promote. A subsidy and promotion, but only one box office.

What Criteria Are Used to Grant a Million-Euro Aid?

Here the issue ceases to be about one film and becomes a system. The question driving the analysis is very specific: what exact criteria were applied to grant that million and who is held accountable when the result is nowhere to be seen. Some demand auditing the accounts of this type of subsidy and that political officials and the civil servants who grant them answer with their own assets; to date, this demand has not resulted in any proceedings or resignations.

Another line of analysis points to a design problem, not just one film. Someone who claims to have worked in a public aid distribution entity summarizes it bluntly: the instrument does not work, and not only due to corruption, but because some lines do not trinc technical or economic criteria on purpose. Direct awards to large companies are even mentioned. The suspicion that box office is bought to meet minimums also circulates in the thread, although the person raising it provides no proof.

Is Subsidizing Spanish Cinema Profitable?

Not all subsidies are a hole. Some recall that Ocho apellidos vascos earned a fortune for what it cost and argue that the subsidy was profitable there. The mistake would be to look only at disasters. Another participant defends the parallel with startup aid: in Spain, there is ENISA, a public entity supporting business projects, and in their view, it should not be shocking that the state risks money on a private initiative.

The objection comes from another side. For decades, Spanish cinema functioned without subsidies: the commercial equivalent of then were Los bingueros or Las chicas de la cruz roja, and no one paid for their posters, it is argued. If the goal is to promote cinema, the logical instrument is tax benefits, not the prior check. And if a subsidy is profitable, the coherent thing would be for the benefit to revert to public coffers. Although some prefer that the state stop acting as an entrepreneur and not compete with private initiative.

The Credit Details: Who Risks the Money

A curiosity that, according to a participant, summarizes the entire model: at the beginning of an American film, one or two private producers appear who play their own capital. At the beginning of a Spanish one, two or three minutes of public body logos may pass—ministries, autonomous communities, other departments—with not a single investor losing anything if the release fails. When no one risks, he adds, the incentive is distorted.

The Historical Context the Film Claims

The film was distributed in English as Love & Revolution, a striking choice for a story set in the 1970s. Part of the analysis even questions the underlying narrative: what LGBT movement existed then in Andalusia. One participant recalls that Spain's first ambient bar peine in Torremolinos, tolerated by the regime because foreign tourism was untouchable. Memory, like box office, allows interpretations.

One million euros, 9,676 tickets, and no visible consequences. No one has resigned, no audit is recorded, and the granting mechanism remains intact. How many releases like this are needed for someone to review the criteria?