Arte France, the French part of the pab-European public broadcaster, has boarded “The Anatomy of a Moment” (“Anatomía de un Instante”) the upcoming Movistar Plus+ series from Spain’s Alberto Rodríguez.
The partnership marks an extension of the ongoing title-by-title relationship between between Arte France and Spanish pay TV/SVOD operator Movistar Plus+, owned by telco Telefónica. Spain’s DLO Producciones also produces. Movistar Plus+ International handles international distribution.
Arte France has co-produced Rodrigo Sorogoyen’s “The New Years,” which world premiered at the 2024 Venice Film Festival in august company, alongside new series from Alfonso Cuarón, Thomas Vinterberg and Joe Wright.
Alauda Ruiz de Azua’s “Querer,” hailed at San Sebastian as the Spanish series of last year, has also been licensed by Arte France. Both series screen at this year’s Series Mania.
Written by regular writing partner Rafa Cobos, and Fran Araujo, a co lead writer on Movistar Plus+ hits such as “Hierro” and “Rafa,” “The Anatomy of a Moment” adapts the non-fiction novel by Javier Cercas about Spain’s 1981 coup d’etat. Money Heist’s Alvaro Morte plays Spanish Prime Minister Adolfo Suárez, Eduard Fernández (”El 47”) takes on the role of Spanish communist party leader Santiago Carrillo and Manolo Solo that of General Gutierrez Mellado who stood up to the rebels attempting to put through the coup. Cercas’ vision go events begs to differs from official accounts.”
“The Anatomy of a Moment,” it was stated later in the Arte France press conference, focuses on “the most turbulent years of the Spanish democratic transition.”
“It’s an account of how our country, Spain, went from a dictatorship to a democracy in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s,” Domingo Corral, Movistar Plus+ director of fiction and entertainment, said in a video message.
“You might remember the very dramatic TV footage of a group of armed military men breaking into the Spanish Congress in 1981, ordering all the MPs that were there to get down on the floor with gunfire. Of course, all the MPs went down on the floor, as I imagine we all have done in such a situation – except three men”: Alfonso Suárez, the Prime Minister, Gutiérrez Mejialo, the Deputy Prime Minister, and Santiago Camillo, at that time, the Secretary of the Communist Party.
“This series is the story of these three ordinary men that behaved like heroes in the most dramatic moment of our recent history. When I told Alex and his team about this story, he said it was very relevant to a European audience and to a universal audience. He also said there were a few lessons that could be drawn from that moment to understand our current political world and situation,” he added.
Nicolás Lecocq, Movistar Plus+ senior manager, international sales, added: “There are several elements that led us to Alberto [Rodríguez]. He was the ideal person to recreate and bring back this subject that fascinates him. On the other hand, it was inspired by an adaptation of a book of a very prestigious author in Spain. It was published at the end of the 2000s,” he said.
“There is the style that Alberto brings to his films and series. This atmosphere of suspense, when he retraces the motivations and the past of each of the characters, and a very careful staging. There is something quite complex to say when it comes to the motivations of each of the characters and he can handle it very well.”
“We have these images in mind: of this coup d’état. But what do they represent? In 1981, it was six years since Franco died. The government doesn’t do too well, and people start to wonder if this democracy is really useful. When the coup d’état comes, there is a fairly passive response from society.”
It was an important yet “very fragile” historical moment, Lecocq said. “50 years later, it jumps to the point that for everyone, Spain is a developed country, where there is great social freedom and social transparency, and it is also an example at a global level of democratic, peaceful transition. There was hardly any violence in this process. 50 years later, I think that the majority of Spanish society recognizes the value of democracy. Like everywhere, there are some extremisms that question it, but it is important at the moment as a subject.”
Earlier that day, during his keynote, Arte France President Bruno Patino underlined the importance of European storytelling.
“As Arte, we were created on the eve of a great European upheaval. We were created by an international treaty, at a time when Europe was asking itself what we were going to become while Germany was reunifying itself. And so, of course, it echoes what is happening today, when Europe is asking itself a lot of geopolitical questions. We have always tried to be ahead of the use revolution,” he noted.
“The stories coming from European countries are at the same time very different, depending on where they come from. We know that. When you see the offer of fiction on Arte, it is very differentiated. But European stories have something in common.”
He added: “Stories are also what structure our relationship with the world. The way we position ourselves, the way we see the world. That’s why we put European stories in motion. We’ve always tried to escape the standardization of stories, as much as possible. Nothing would be worse than a world with a single story that is totally standardized. Working on making sure these stories are diverse, coming from all over Europe, in one way or another, is working on our emancipation.”
