Introduction

This research aims to analyze the relationship between international festivals and the films shown in cinemas in one European country: Spain. To this end, we have analyzed which world cinema films arrive at the two most important international festivals in Spain -San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF) and the Valladolid International Film Week (Seminci, in Spanish)- and, among these films, which are finally shown in Spanish cinemas. We have studied some of their characteristics and what factors may have influenced their passage from festivals to commercial film screens. We consider this dynamism to be significant since the evolution of the concept of world cinema itself depends on it, and it is still the subject of academic analysis and debate.

According to data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (^{UIS. Stat, 2022}), most feature films made worldwide are produced outside the Western countries. The UIS. Stat covers the period 2011-2017. As Figure 1 shows, almost half of the feature films produced in 2016 (9 080 films worldwide) came from seven countries in Asia and Latin America (4 291 films).

Source: ^{UIS. Stat (2022)}.

Figure 1 The seven non-Western countries with the highest number of feature films produced in 2016 

Box office reports show that a very small percentage of this large flow of capital and entertainment reaches international screens. This establishes an asymmetrical relationship with Hollywood products that enjoy a broad distribution privilege on the world’s screens. In 2016, the United States produced 656 feature films, which places it third on the production list, behind India and China, with only 7.22 % of the total of 9 080 feature films produced that year (^{UIS. Stat, 2022}).

It is important to recall that, paradoxically, not all films produced outside the West are considered world cinema. Beyond being confined to worldwide film productions, the term connotes some specific quality that has to be recognized by some international entity. The usual way for this global cinematic flow to become world cinema is to achieve international recognition by screening at European festivals. In this sense, traditionally, only a small percentage of films produced in non-Western countries achieve festival recognition and success and reach international audiences. As a result, sometimes films that are very popular with local audiences remain invisible to the rest of the world (^{López-Díez, 2023}) because they are less likely to be recognized by A-list festivals than auteur films, which have a very different aesthetic from Hollywood. In other words, world cinema is a construction and a broad consensus, which is made, as ^{Nagib (2020)} notes, on its potential to be aesthetically antagonistic to US blockbusters.

In recent decades, world cinema has been the subject of numerous academic debates (see, for example, ^{Chapman, 2003}; ^{Chaudhuri, 2005}; ^{Dennison & Lim, 2006}; ^{Deshpande & Mazaj, 2018}; ^{Durovicová & Newman, 2009}; ^{Elsaesser, 2009}; ^{Hill & Church Gibson, 2000}; ^{Martin-Jones, 2011}; ^{Nagib, 2011}; ^{Nagib et al., 2011}). At the same time, mapping global film production is a complex task. The terrain is so vast and varied that any approach must necessarily be selective. In this sense, ^{Nagib’s (2011)} argument points to realism as the intrinsic aesthetic quality of world cinema that sets it apart from Hollywood. However, the enormous wealth of emerging popular cinemas outside the West has also sought to relate to Hollywood in their respective labels (Bollywood, Nollywood or Hallyuwood are some examples). As various authors point out (^{Deshpande & Mazaj, 2018}; ^{Nagib, 2020}; ^{Stam, 2019}), the term world cinema continues to revolve, by presence or omission, around the gravitational axis of Hollywood. A recent study (^{López-Díez, 2023}) observed that the term was more widely used in Web of Science than others proposed to replace it, such as transnational cinema or global cinema.

As ^{Andrew (2004)} noted, the term world cinema sought to map non-hegemonic world cinema. The concept came to replace other similar concepts that, after the fall of the Berlin Wall, fell into disuse, such as Third World cinema, foreign art cinema, or Third Cinema (^{Mazierska, 2020}), which already in the 1990s showed theoretical difficulties to be applied to a vast and varied film production terrain beyond the cinema of the “militant collectives” that ^{Solanas and Getino (1976)} pointed out in their day.

In the era of globalization, and especially after the digital revolution and the rise of film consumption through streaming platforms (^{Parvulescu, 2020}), the term world cinema, as ^{Chaudhuri (2005)} noted at the time, addresses “a huge multinational system consisting of television networks, new production and distribution technologies, and international co-productions” (p. 2). In this regard, according to Chaudhuri’s assessment, cinema:

Is no longer a separate art but part of the digital convergence with other media. Through these transnational processes of film production, financing and distribution, it increasingly makes sense to think in terms of “world cinema” (p. 2).

World cinema studies today not only address relations between world cinema and Hollywood, but -as ^{Chaudhuri (2005)}, ^{Chen and Chua (2015)}, and other researchers address- develop cinematic relations across nations and, sometimes, as is the case of cinema in diaspora and exile, even beyond national issues. To put it briefly, world cinema has to be constantly reread in the context of a broad network of transnational relations.

As it was mentioned, world cinema shows enough complexities to be mapped (^{Andrew, 2004}). It is a continuously evolving network of cultural relations. Therefore, given the impossibility of considering the phenomenon in its totality, current studies have moved towards specific approaches to certain nodes of production and consumption.

A separate question, and the focus of this study, is an analysis of the arrival and consumption of world film industries at film festivals as sites of entry and spaces where the cultural criteria that determine the boundaries of world cinema are tacitly forged. From this perspective, a focus on festival dynamics approaches these events as legitimizing, as well as using ^{Thornton’s (2020)} term, taste-making machinery. In a close reading of ^{Bourdieu’s (1984}, ¹⁹⁹³⁾ texts on taste as an ideological category, Thornton studies how festival programmers can re-signify cinema through selection and approval strategies.

According to Cousins (quoted in ^{Thornton, 2020}), festival programmers “must think of themselves as storytellers and stylists” (p. 27), a claim Thornton extends to the requirements for the festival curatorship as “a form of storytelling as metatextual paradigm” (p. 27). World cinema, seen through this prism, is both the outcome and an output of festivals. This metatextual paradigm, formed by decisions -not free of ideologies, selection processes and orientation- facilitates festival outcomes in the form of the films that manage to be awarded, recognized and, consequently, distributed on cinema screens and subsequently in a wide network of consumption. Hence, as Thornton concludes, festivals are the constructors of public taste and the determinants of the connotations of world cinema.

Studying festival results is important for interpreting the possible factors that construct cinematic taste in a given place. This is especially significant when we consider how non-Western filmmakers adapt their future films in response to this taste and how European audiences access a selection of films as a sample of a different culture. The result is the creation of an imaginary communication network. A specific study of quantitative data on the arrival of films at festivals and their presence on cinema screens can show a possible node of this communication network.

Our intention in this study is to analyze the arrival of non-Western films in a European country and to observe the results in quantitative terms. Specifically, this article aims to examine the usual channels of this process of arrival on screens through an analysis of exhibition and consumption data. There is no doubt that film festivals play a crucial role in bringing Western audiences into contact with films from other geographies. In our case study, Spain has been considered as this point of contact, in particular, through the two main Spanish film festivals: the San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF) and the Valladolid International Film Week (Seminci).

The San Sebastian International Film Festival and the Valladolid International Film Week

After the Second World War, although Hollywood remained the commercial benchmark, film festivals began to manage the “quality of films” (^{Andrew, 2009}). Magazines such as Cahiers du Cinema and Sight and Sound sanctioned this quality. At first, non-Western films did not make it to European festivals. However, after films such as Rashomon (Akira Kurosawa, 1950) or Satyajit Ray’s Apu trilogy (1955, 1956 and 1959) won awards at some European film festivals, non-Western films tried to conform to the standard of these events in order to compete in them (^{Berghahn, 2021}; ^{Mazaj & Deshpande, 2020}). Japan has been one of the non-Western countries whose films have won top prizes at the Cannes, Venice, Berlin, SIFF and Seminci film festivals.

According to ^{De Valck (2007)}, Bourdieu’s concept of “symbolic capital” can be applied to the understanding of festivals as sites of cultural legitimation and spaces of convergence between “culture, commerce, experimentation, entertainment, geopolitical interests, and funding on a global scale” (p. 16). Festivals are places of creation and renewal of spectators’ tastes and cinephilia practices, as well as places where value is ascribed and where singular auteurs and auteur films are discovered (^{De Valck, 2007}). Moreover, as suggested by ^{De Valck (2007}, ²⁰¹⁶⁾ and other authors such as ^{Elsaesser (2005)} and ^{Czach (2004)}, European festivals were originally conceived as spaces of response and deliberation with Hollywood cinema.

Festivals are not only physical spaces of interaction and cultural exchange but also places of generating counterweights in the historical balance of the confrontation between Europe and Hollywood cinema. In other words, world cinema is a construction, the result of processes and policies of selection, evaluation, and exhibition of films at festivals, originally European, in their long history of confrontation and fascination with Hollywood.

In Spain, film festivals appeared shortly after the Second World War as a consequence of a particular economic stability. The SSIFF was founded in 1953 and is one of the oldest film festivals in Spain. Since 1957, it has been a category A festival, according to the International Federation of Film Producers Associations (FIAPF). This festival was conceived as a space where a certain freedom of expression could be exercised during the Franco dictatorship. This freedom, as the festival’s website states, is maintained today in order to keep it as “a showcase for the most restless and innovative cinema of the moment” (^{San Sebastian International Film Festival [SSIFF], 2022, para. 3}). In recent years, the festival has adopted a policy of reinforcing specific spaces for “non-hegemonic” film industries, among which its commitment to Latin American films stands out (^{SSIFF, 2022}).

The Valladolid International Film Week (Seminci) was born from a modest proposal to improve the cultural life of the city of Valladolid in 1956 (^{González Lozano, 2013}). It began as a cultural activity designed for Easter to attract tourists to the city, but over time, it took the form of a film festival with its own character (^{González Lozano, 2013}). In 1963, it took the name Week of Religious Cinema and Human Values (Semana de Cine Religioso y Valores Humanos). It retained this title for barely a decade, only to change again, at the end of the dictatorship, in 1973, to its current name, Seminci, an abbreviation of the Spanish term of Semana Internacional de Cine, which, according to ^{Gónzalez Lozano (2013)}, “comes from the custom of using acronyms for telegrams” (p. 506). At the end of the 1970s, amid Spain’s transition to democracy, the festival was consolidated as a space for the exhibition of films with artistic values. The international vocation of the Seminci over the years has made it one of the leading film festivals in Spain and a regular venue for the exhibition of world cinema films.

Objectives

The main objective of this study is to investigate the pattern of access and consumption of world cinema in Spain as an example of a European country. We focus on Spain because of its proximity to our research centers. To this end, we pose the following research questions: 1) how many of world cinema feature films were selected at the main Spanish world cinema festivals?; 2) how many of world cinema feature films that were selected at the main Spanish festivals were subsequently screened in Spanish cinemas?; 3) from which geographical areas of the world does this flow of world cinema feature films originate?; 4) what percentage of these feature films are co-productions?, and 5) what are the determining factors in the subsequent distribution of feature films on commercial screens?

Methodology

In order to answer these research questions, we have focused on a specific territorial and temporal scope. Firstly, we consider world cinema those films produced or co-produced by non-Western countries. Western countries are defined as those in Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. For the geographical categorization of the films by country and region, we have used the United Nations Standard Country or Area Codes for Statistical Use (^{UN, 1999}). Therefore, the reader will find South America instead of Latin America, or South Asia instead of the Middle East.

As for the geographical scope of the study, we have chosen Spain for technical reasons, such as its proximity, the accessibility of official data, and the importance of world cinema consumption in this country within Europe (^{Higson, 2021}). The time frame has been five years, from 2016 to 2021, in which we have had access to official data from the Institute of Cinematography and Audiovisual Arts (Instituto de la Cinematografía y de las Artes Audiovisuales, ICAA for its Spanish abbreviation) of the Spanish Ministry of Culture and Sport. This has also allowed us to observe the influence of the context of the Covid-19 pandemic on the arrival and exhibition of world cinema in Spain.

In terms of festivals, we have chosen world cinema films screened at two international festivals: 1) the San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF), which is the only Spanish festival in category A (Specialized Feature Film Competitive Festivals), according to FIAPF accreditation; and 2) the Valladolid International Film Week (Seminci), founded in 1956, which has a space traditionally dedicated to non-Western cinema.

The methodological process consisted of identifying the world cinema feature films that were screened at the chosen festivals and in the period under study, according to the data provided on the official websites of these festivals. We then analyzed which of these films were screened in Spanish cinemas, according to ICAA data.

Concerning our first two research questions, one issue that has arisen in the data collection for this study is how to compute the repetition of the same film in the two festivals studied. Thus, as we will argue later, four films are repeated in both festivals (see Results section). In this sense, we have chosen to include repetitions when we wanted to compare how many world cinema films have been included in each festival in a given year. However, in global terms, i.e., to calculate the total number of films screened at both festivals, we have excluded the four repeated films in order to facilitate the analysis of the different films that have reached Spanish cinemas each year.

Results

World cinema feature films screened at SSIFF and Seminci between 2016 and 2021

As Figure 2 shows, in the period 2016-2021, almost one in three feature films screened at the chosen festivals belonged to world cinema (29.2 %). This percentage has ranged from almost 40 % (in 2020, SSIFF) to 21.1 % (in 2020, Seminci).

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and ^{Seminci programs (2016 to 2021)}.

Figure 2 Percentage of world cinema films screened at SSIFF and Seminci (2016-2021) 

Table 1 World cinema feature films in Spanish cinemas, previously screened at the ssiff or Seminci festivals, in 2016-2021 

	Exhibited at festivals	Exhibited in movie theaters	Percentage
ssiff16	32	13	40
sem16	31	10	32
ssiff17	39	18	46.1
sem17	30	7	23.3
ssiff18	44	23	52.2
sem18	25	11	44
ssiff19	49	22	44.8
sem19	32	10	31.2
ssiff20	37	12	32.4
sem20	18	4	22.2
ssiff21	40	11	27.5
sem21	24	4	16.6
Total	401	145	36.1

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016 to 2021), and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

As Figure 2 shows, in general, in all the years studied, except 2016, the percentage of world cinema feature films screened out of the total number of feature films at the festivals was higher at SSIFF than at Seminci.

From festivals to cinema screens

In this section, we will provide the data referring to feature films screened in cinemas that were previously shown at one of the two festivals (SSIFF or Seminci).

If we try to compare the presence of world cinema at both festivals, of the 401 non-Western feature films screened at SSIFF and Seminci in the period 2016-2021, 145 feature films have been screened in Spanish cinemas. Only four theatrically screened films were at both festivals: Air Pocket (La idea de un lago, Mumenthaler, Switzerland and Argentina, 2016), Yuli: The Carlos Acosta Story (Yuli, Bollaín, Spain, Cuba, UK and Germany, 2018), Mirai (Hosoda, Japan, 2018) and Sagu & Pagu: Büyük Define (Bastürk, Turkey, 2017). Therefore, if we exclude these repeated films -either at both festivals or at the same festival, but in different years- the number of different films screened at SSIFF and Seminci is reduced to 397, and the number of different films screened in cinemas and festivals is reduced to 141 (35.5 %). The statistics shown in Figure 3 have been calculated using this data.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021).

Figure 3 Percentage of different world cinema feature films screened in Spanish cinemas, previously screened at the SSIFF or Seminci festivals, each year 

World cinema-producing countries

As Figure 4 shows, the region that produced or co-produced the highest percentage of films screened at the two festivals that were eventually shown theatrically was South America, with 59 films; followed by East Asia, with 35 films, and Central America and West Asia, both with 21 films. It should be noted that, in some cases, all the countries involved in the co-productions belonged to the same geographical region.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 4 Number of global film co-productions involving Europe or North America 

Figure 5 shows that European countries, including Spain, participated 91 times in world cinema co-productions that were shown in Spanish cinemas and previously screened at the aforementioned festivals. This figure also shows that the number of European co-productions in world cinema is much higher than that of North American co-productions, which only reach eight co-productions. Among the European participants, Spain participated in 33 films, and the rest of Europe in 58. France stands out with 40 co-productions.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 5 Co-productions by Western countries 

Productions from three, four or more countries

As can be seen in Figure 6, the largest number of films reaching theaters were productions from a single country, followed by those from two, three, and four or more countries.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 6 Number and percentage of films and the countries that produced them 

Co-productions with Spain

If we focus on Spain, we can see that the country with which Spain co-produces most is Argentina (44 % of Spanish co-productions of feature films at festivals), followed by Mexico and France (17.6 %). According to data from ^{UIS. Stat (2022)}, from 2005 to 2017, Argentina occupied a privileged place in the co-production regime of fiction feature films with Spain. A historical context of this fact was studied by ^{Elena (2011)}, who considered the 2000s as a “true golden age” of Argentine film releases in Spain, far above other South American cinemas (p. 4).

The boom of Argentine cinema in Spain in the 2000s was the cause of the growth of Spanish-Argentine co-productions, which, according to the same author’s estimate, in the years 2000-2009 reached 131 titles, “which represents more than 44 % of total co-productions with Latin America in this decade” (p. 17). Figure 7 shows the still good health of Spanish-Argentine co-production in the period of this study (2016-2021), which demonstrates a continuation concerning the previous decade, studied by Elena.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 7 Countries with which Spain co-produces 

In addition to Argentina, ^{Elena’s (2011)} study also points to Spanish-Argentine co-productions occupying a place once occupied by Spanish-Mexican co-productions. Due to this historically consolidated relationship, it is not surprising that Mexico occupies a second place on the list of co-productions between 2016 and 2021 (as shown in Figure 7). In this regard, it is also worth noting the place occupied by France in Spanish co-productions, as shown in the ^{UIS. Stat (2022)}, has always been present in the top 10 producer countries with Spain in the last decade. It has even occupied a first place during the 2011-2014 period, in close competition with Argentina.

In this regard, it is worth noting that, among these co-productions, as Figure 8 shows, more than half of Spanish co-productions were with a single country. A possible explanation could be related, as ^{Bondebjerg (2016)} argues, to the fact that transnational audiovisual co-productions, when involving more than two national production systems, can generate not only advantages but also disadvantages, as different “national ways of directing or different styles of acting” can collide (p. 5).

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 8 Co-production with Spain. Number of countries in co-production 

Number of spectators in cinemas

In terms of the box office results of world cinema feature films previously screened at festivals, as shown in Figure 9, SSIFF has shown greater success, especially in the years 2016 and 2019.

Source: The authors with data extracted from the SSIFF and Seminci programs (2016-2021) and from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 9 Number of spectators of world cinema films in Spanish cinemas, previously screened at SSIFFF and Seminci 

If we compare the number of spectators of world cinema films shown in theaters that were previously screened at the chosen festivals with the total number of spectators in Spanish cinemas in the same period, we observe that there was a strong increase in 2019, while in 2020, in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of spectators decreased significantly (Figure 10).

Source: The authors with data from ^{ICAA (2022a)}.

Figure 10 Percentage of viewers attending world cinema films relative to the total number of moviegoers in Spain 

The data in Figure 10 on the number of viewers shows some regularity (2020 and the pandemic context aside) with occasional disturbances. The disruptions, in the form of sudden rises in the two years 2016 and 2019, are due to two hugely popular world cinema feature films: Parasite (Gisaengchung, Joon-ho, South Korea, 2019), and To Steal from a Thief (Cien años del perdón, Carparsoro, Argentina/Spain, 2016), a Spanish-Argentine co-production, which surpasses the million-viewer mark and is positioned well above the average for world cinema in Spain (^{ICAA, 2022a}). According to the statistics from the ^{ICAA (2022a)}, the latter was the fourth most successful film (in the national category, or co-production between Spain and other countries) in the Spanish box office, following three other films: A Monster Calls (Un monstruo viene a verme, Bayona, Spain-United States, 2016) with over 4.5 million viewers; Palm Trees in the Snow (Palmeras en la nieve, González Molina, Spain, 2015), which surpasses 1.8 million viewers; and A Stroke of Luck (Villaviciosa de al lado, García Fernández-Velilla, Spain, 2016), with approximately 1.2 million viewers. If we focus only on world cinema, the change becomes significant again. Following To Steal from a Thief, the second and third highest-grossing world cinema releases are The Distinguished Citizen (El ciudadano ilustre, Cohn and Duprat, Spain-Argentina, 2016), with about 145 000 viewers, and The Salesman (Forushande, Farhadi, Iran-France, 2016), with about 125 000.

Regarding 2019, the Oscar-winning film Parasite can be considered the decisive element for the sudden rise in the Spanish box office that year. The movie recorded 1.3 million viewers in that year. As for the popularity of Spanish-Argentine co-productions, the pattern from 2016 repeats itself in 2019. In the second and third positions, after Parasite, are Heroic Losers (La odisea de los giles, Borensztein, 2019) and the animated feature Turu, the Wacky Hen (La gallina Turuleca, Monigote and Gondell, 2019), with over 155 000 and 133 000 viewers, respectively.

Conclusions

In this study, we have attempted to address several research questions that could shed some light on world cinema and the relationship between Spanish international film festivals and films exhibited in Spanish cinemas. Regarding the number of world cinema feature films screened at festivals, it is observed that approximately one-third of them (29.2 %) have been produced or co-produced by non-Western countries. As shown in Table 1, considering both festivals together, the year with the highest percentage of world cinema films was 2019. Meanwhile, we have not found studies with analogous figures referring to other European festivals with which to compare these results.

Our analysis shows that approximately one-third of the world cinema feature films screened at the selected festivals eventually made their way to Spanish cinemas. In this regard, the average percentage stands at 35.5 %. After being screened at festivals, the year with the highest number of films reached cinema screens was 2018, when almost half (47 %) of the world cinema feature films went through festivals to reach Spanish theaters. However, concerning the number of viewers, 2019 stands out, with the screening of Parasite being the most successful in Spanish theaters.

The results of our study show that the percentage of world cinema films is higher at the San Sebastian International Film Festival (SSIFF) than at the Valladolid International Film Week (Seminci). The data for the SSIFF are 10 % higher than those for Seminci for the entire study period (Figure 2). The average is 34.2 % at the SSIFF, compared to 24 % at Seminci. Additionally, in each of the six years studied, world cinema films from the SSIFF have reached theaters in greater numbers than those from Seminci. One possible explanation could be that the SSIFF may have a more commercial aspect than Seminci. For example, the four world cinema films with the highest number of viewers in Spanish theaters during the period 2016-2021 (Parasite, To Steal from a Thief, The Bar, and Heroic Losers) were exhibited at the SSIFF, not at Seminci. The commercial aspect of the SSIFF can also be seen in the existence of the Donostia Awards, which recognize “the extraordinary contribution to the world of cinema by great figures that will forever remain in its history” (^{SSIFF, 2023, para. 1}). This award typically goes to movie stars or filmmakers, usually from Hollywood or international commercial cinema.

Regarding the regions and countries whose films have been most exhibited in Spanish theaters after being previously screened at the SSIFF and/or Seminci, the data shows that South America is the region with the highest percentage. That is, 59 films in the studied period, represent 41.8 % of the total of 141 films screened in theaters and, previously, at SSIFF/Seminci. This is consistent with the relationship between Spain and some South American countries, which is oriented by common cultural aspects -such as the Spanish language- facilitating the distribution and consumption of films. This is reflected in Argentina being the country with the highest number of films exhibited in Spanish theaters and festivals. Thus, in the case of productions from a single producer or co-productions between two countries, Argentina ranks at the top of the list with 20 films.

Although the common language seems to play an important role, our results reveal that East Asia, with 35 films, is the second region with the highest number of films screened at the SSIFF/Seminci that ultimately reach Spanish theaters. This represents 24.8 % of the total world cinema feature films screened in theaters and SSIFF/Seminci. Within East Asia, Japanese films stand out. In productions from one or two countries, Japan is present in 17 of the total 31 films, followed at a considerable distance by China (five) and South Korea (four). Japan’s position could be explained by the traditional importance of Japanese cinema within world cinema, pioneering in winning awards at European festivals (^{Elena, 1999}). It is also consistent with data on Asian cinema and its exhibition in Spanish theaters in recent years (^{Das & López-Díez, 2022}). France stands out among Western countries co-producing films with non-Western countries that reach Spanish theaters, co-producing 28.3 % of the total films exhibited in theaters and at the SSIFF and Seminci festivals (40 films in total), surpassing Spain (33 films, representing 23.4 % of the total).

As mentioned, the importance of Spain in this co-production regime can be explained by the common language and the relationship with South and Central America. However, a possible explanation for the importance of France in co-productions may be the historical role played by French critics and academics in defining world cinema. Additionally, France hosts the Cannes Film Festival, the most important European film event, and is the home country of influential magazines such as Cahiers du Cinéma and Positif. However, this festival-co-production relationship is not observed in Germany and Italy, European countries where the other two most important festivals, the Berlinale and Venice, are held. During the studied period, Germany co-produced 17 films, while Italy co-produced only one. Meanwhile, Belgium co-produced eight films.

Furthermore, we consider the limited presence of Indian cinema, one of the largest film industries in the world, to be relevant; this is confirmed by other studies (^{Das & López-Díez, 2022}). One possible reason for this absence may be the duration of Indian commercial films, which traditionally exceed three hours and currently average around two hours and 45 minutes. As argued earlier, the films screened at the SSIFF/Seminci that have made it to Spanish theaters have an average duration of around 1.5 hours. However, independent Indian films are gradually adapting to the duration of Western films, and many are approaching 90 or 120 minutes.

Lastly, we would like to highlight how the two most popular world cinema films in Spanish theaters, To Steal from a Thief and Parasite, represent a synthesis of the presence of world cinema on Spanish screens. On the one hand, they captured the attention of the Spanish audience after receiving multiple awards in the international festival circuit, especially in the case of Parasite, after winning the Oscar. Officially classified as thrillers, the relative success of both films leads us to question to what extent the dramatic character of films from world cinema will be decisive for their presence on European screens. The conjunction of these two cases, albeit coincidental, points to an important finding of this study: the two most determining factors in the arrival and distribution of world cinema in Spain are, at least during the period of this study, recognition at festivals and Spanish-South American collaboration.

To better understand these data, we aimed to place them in the context of official statistics on the cinema exhibition market in Spain. In this regard, world cinema films obtained minimal revenue in the domestic market. In the same box office statistics, the position of American productions, which enjoy an average of around 60 % market share, demonstrates the Hollywood/world cinema binary quantitatively. It is thus noted that world cinema and Hollywood are at opposite ends, marking an antagonism that can be interpreted as a possible basis for theoretical debates about the definitions of world cinema mentioned in the introduction of this study.