Alauda Ruíz de Azúa’s San Sebastian and Goya best film winner “Sundays” (“Los Domingos”) has been co-acquired for U.S. distribution by Outsider Pictures.
The deal announcement comes just weeks after “Sundays” swept picture, director, actress (Patricia López Arnaiz), supporting actress (Nagore Aranburu) and original screenplay at Spain’s 40th Spanish Academy Goya Awards.
Grossing €4.9 million ($5.8 million) for distributor Bteam at Spanish theaters, making “Sundays” the third biggest Spanish release of 2025, “Sundays” had already been sold by Le Pacte to half the major movie markets in the world by last December.
A U.S. deal, however, is still a major milestone, especially when it comes, as in this case, with a commitment to a minimum theatrical release in at least 10 of the top 50 markets in the U.S. in this Fall, including New York and Los Angeles.
Also hitting Film Affinity España’s ranking of one of the Top 10 Spanish films ever made, “Sundays” turns on Ainara, 17, a student at a religious school in a city in northern Spain who begins the film by begging aunt Maite to persuade her father Iñaki to let her go on a retreat organized by the local Betinas convent nuns, an enclosed order.
Maite, a flamboyant modern woman, and Iñaki, owner of a failing restaurant business, had thought that the only question about Ainara’s future is what she studies at university. They learn with concern that Ainara is seriously considering embracing the life of a cloistered nun.
Above all, “Sundays” emerges, as Ruiz de Azúa has observed, as a study of failing family dynamics, plagued by intolerance, where key family members view Ainara’s vocation through a lens of self interest ( Iñaki) or egocentrism (Maite).
Neither exercise a key quality for many contemporary film directors and TV creators: a sense of empathy, achieved notably by Ruiz de Azúa herself by rendering Ainara’s religious vocation psychologically credible as she receives larger understanding from local Prioress Mother Isabel than either Iñaki or Maite.
Paul Hudson of Outsider Pictures closed the U.S. deal with Romain Rancurel, head of international sales at Le Pacte.
“Having acquired director Alauda Ruiz de Azua’s previous film ‘Lullaby,’ I was excited to see ‘Sundays.’ It is a film that stays with you long after it’s over, it never preaches to the audience and stays true to the characters,” said Hudson.
“We are thrilled to partner with Outsider Pictures and Paul Hudson to bring ‘Sundays’ to U.S. audiences this Fall,” Rancurel told Variety. “It’s a wonderful film that has already connected so strongly with audiences around the world, and we are delighted that American moviegoers will now have the chance to discover it in theaters,” he added. “We very much hope the tremendous success the film has enjoyed so far will continue in the U.S.”
Co-produced by Movistar Plus+, the biggest Spanish pay TV and SVOD operator, and a large vindication of its drive into making what it calls ‘event auteur’ films, “Sundays” is also produced by Buenapinta Media (“The Mole Agent”), Encanta Films (“Wounded”), Sayaka Producciones (“Daniela Forever”), Colosé Producciones (“Society of the Snow”), Think Studio (“Mirage”) and Los Desencuentros Película.
“Sundays’” Goya triumph topped a remarkable 12 months for Ruíz de Azua who also scored last year the top prize at Series Mania, Europe’s biggest TV festival, with “Querer,” marking a remarkable same-year double.
‘Sundays’
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