Eduard Fernández completes his great year by winning the National Film Award

After the Goya for Marco , recognition as one of the year's great actors for the false victim of the Nazi concentration camps and for his undisputed leading role in '47 , and the Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts, Eduard Fernández has won the National Film Award presented by the Ministry of Culture. The distinction closes the perfect year for the Catalan, who has become one of the most successful actors in Spanish cinema. Only surpassed in statuettes by Javier Bardem, the most international of them all, he will now also share the place of honor with him at the national awards.

According to the jury's decision, Eduard Fernández was unanimously chosen for "being one of the most outstanding actors in our cinema" and also for "having had a 2024 with two outstanding performances in two completely different films." "The noble man who fights for the common good in El 47 and the role for which he won the Goya for Best Leading Actor in Marco , where he transforms into a complex and contradictory figure," they point out in those conclusions. In fact, no one, during the awards race, doubted that this would be the year for the Catalan actor. The only question is which of the two roles he would end up winning.

Last year, the jury recognized the work of producer and founder of Elastica Films, María Zamora, the second specialist in this field to receive the award after Esther García in 2018. In the more than four decades since this award was presented, which was inaugurated in 1980 with the distinction given to Carlos Saura, only two production companies have received it. In its 45 years, the National Film Award has been awarded primarily to the leading figures who have left their mark on this discipline in Spain. Actors and actresses such as Javier Bardem, Carmen Maura, Fernando Fernán Gómez, Penélope Cruz, and Marisa Paredes . And directors such as Saura himself, Montxo Aramendi, Isabel Coixet, Juan Antonio Bayona, Luis García Berlanga, and Vicente Aranda .

However, there has also been some small space for other disciplines that do not monopolize the front rows, in terms of public visibility. In 2012, the award went to costume designer Yvonne Blake , the first woman to receive this distinction without having been an actress. In 2014, it also went to screenwriter Lola Salvador for the breadth of her career. In 1993, José Luis Guarner , one of the great names in Spanish film criticism, had already won it. And, a year later, in 1994, the historic director of photography Juan Mariné , who died last February and won the Honorary Goya in 2024.

In the last decade, the National Film Award has also seen a marked tendency toward honoring women, coinciding with the advances of feminist movements in Spanish society. Since 2016, when Ángela Molina received it, seven women have won it. José Sacristán and Antonio Banderas, in addition to the recently awarded Eduard Fernández, have been the only men in the last 10 years to receive an award that also comes with 30,000 euros.