19/12/2025 - A panel highlighted how young people no longer find a reference point in cinemas and analysed possible strategies

“Operation and distribution between Italy and Spain: markets and strategies compared” was the title of the panel organised by Box Office in collaboration with ANEC (Associazione Nazionale Esercenti Cinema) at the Sorrento Industry Days (1-4 December), during which a study was presented, based on data up to November 2025, which offers a detailed photograph of performances in both countries. The two markets have similar dimensions, with around 3,500 screens and about 70 million spectators in 2024.

Gabriele D’Andrea (VP Managing Director at Mubi Italy and CEO of Circuito Cinema) redefined the target: the most faithful core remains the 18-34 year-old range, sensitive to auteur cinema, while under-18s are losing their familiarity with cinema screens. Amongst the factors are the duration of films, the perception that the experience isn’t “cool”, and the attraction towards short, fragmented and socialised content. In short, cinema-going is not perceived or lived as a shared ritual.

Spain confirms this: Álvaro Postigo (President of the FECE - Federación de Cines de España) denounced the abuse of digital practices, which impose ephemeral stimuli preventing information sedimentation. The solution lies in balancing between digital and physical presence, capturing attention in the physical spaces that young people go to, “on the street, in cities, at bus stops”. Andrea Romeo (CEO and Editorial Director of I Wonder Pictures) retorted: social media dominates and “kids on the subway are looking at their smartphones”. Romeo argued for a hybridization between digital (to create anticipation and conversation) and physical cinemas (for sharing). One needs to turn films into events, even for independent films. “We did it for The Substance [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Coralie Fargeat
film profile], also thanks to the collaboration with Elastica Film and Enrique Costa, and the content generated by users themselves transformed the film into a phenomenon, creating conversations online and also in real life, and this year, we tried to repeat that with The Ugly Stepsister [+see also:
film review
trailer
film profile]”.

Lara Pérez Camiña (partner at BTeam Pictures and co-president at ADICINE) instead brought up the Spanish example of Sirāt [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Óliver Laxe
film profile], which became an event. Camiña agreed on the importance of the digital, but argued that communication is above all about messaging: one needs to translate the film into an idea that can speak to the audience. She also cited Sundays [+see also:
film review
trailer
interview: Alauda Ruiz de Azúa
film profile], the story of a teenager who announces to her family her desire to become a nun: “for us, the message was that it was a film about love. One must work carefully on films that maybe don’t usually seem appealing to make them interesting to all audiences”.

Another topic was the sustainability of the current cinema ecosystem in Italy and in Spain faced with an overabundance of offers. Postigo recalled that a few years ago, around 220 films would come out in Spain in a year, while today, we have reached 360. Although the massive presence of multiplex cinemas makes the simultaneous release of multiple titles easier, “a shared self-regulation from the industry is necessary”. For Lara Camiña, a greater selection and a more attentive treatment of the positioning of films are required. For Mario Lorini (President of ANEC), Italian single-screen cinemas are forced towards a rapid turnover, which penalises the life of films. Carlos Prada (VP Theatrical Distribution & Local Production Italy and Spain for Warner Bros. Discovery) recognised that “there are films that simply do not hold up to the cinematic experience”, a collective effort of evaluation of content is required because the cinema is a social ritual, it must offer added value compared to the couch at home. For Andrea Romeo, instead, it is positive that so many players with different editorial lines exist, and he argued that reducing the number of screens for certain titles “isn’t a failure, but a strategic choice”.

In closing, the need to intensify dialogue between operation and distribution emerged and Camiña added that producers should also get involved, in order to complete this vision for the entire supply chain. Romeo suggested an increase in cinema ticket prices, in order to adapt to production costs, while Lorini suggested looking at alternative formulas, such as flat subscriptions for young people, as adopted in the Netherlands. Postigo expressed doubts about the very structure of sales in Spain, where the capillary distribution of multiplexes and mega-multiplexes no longer seems sustainable, and hopes for a return to smaller, urban and capillary theatres, following the italian model. Camiña concluded with the need for communication that can express the beauty of cinema at the cinema, involving talent, influencers, creative strategies and appropriate investment, in order to rebuild an authentic connection between new generations and the cinema.

(Translated from Italian)