He was only 23 years old when he premiered as a professional in the cinema. Enrique Cerezo began as a camera assistant in Come to Germany, Pepe (Pedro Lazaga, 1971). Today he is one of the most consolidated producers on the national scene, he owns 70% of Spanish films and presides over Egeda, an entity that encompasses audiovisual producers from Spain and Latin America. In addition, Cerezo is the promoter of the Platino and Forqué awards.
The veteran producer has passed through the Catalan capital to inaugurate a master's degree in audiovisual production at the University of Barcelona and to visit the Josep Maria Queraltó collection of film material, one of the most important in Europe. In the meantime, Cerezo has made a small gap to answer questions from La Vanguardia.
It would be difficult to find someone who has not seen the adventures of Alfredo Landa and José Sacristán in Come to Germany, Pepe. Cinema is a legacy for future generations. Will the same thing happen with platforms? “Platforms are a very important means of mass entertainment. They are a good idea, but the cinema has been producing great films for 130 years that, sometimes, the platforms use to make remakes without achieving the desired success. The films should succeed in theaters and then be seen on platforms. I watch movies from the 1940s and they excite me. But the series for young people on the platforms are something else, there will be no one who sees them in 2070, ”says the producer.
The platforms and the coronavirus crisis, which forced theaters to close, have been a blow to the sector, but Cerezo is convinced that "cinema is going to recover." “Cinema is never going to die”, he emphasizes categorically and is convinced that “it will return with more intensity”. In fact, he has already taken that path of recovery: “Spanish cinema is in a good moment, after the pandemic a lot has been produced. An example: Santiago Segura is already in the third installment of Father there is only one. He has been successful and we must congratulate him for having risked producing in such difficult times”.
We interrupted the conversation for a moment, because a young man was walking down the street who recognized Cerezo as president of Atlético de Madrid. The boy is from the club, he asks for a photo and wishes him many victories in the future for the colchoneros. We return to the conversation with the Platinum Ibero-American Film Awards “which are now going to be ten years old and have been a total and absolute success, because they bring together 23 countries, they allow Latin cinema to cross borders and they also have an economic impact. In the last edition, which was held in May in Madrid, the advertising impact was 130 million dollars”.
Time is running out, but we cannot say goodbye without a reference to the recently approved controversial Audiovisual Law that has not been to the liking of small producers: “No law is perfect, perhaps that is why they change so frequently. This standard wants to please everyone and that is very difficult. The figure of the individual producer can become something real, but with this law it will not be achieved, because the televisions are against it”, concludes Cerezo, who is still at the foot of the canyon with a new projected film, Trip to Nowhere.
