Adaptations of Literary Works as an Industrial Practice in the Fifties

Abstract

Adapting literary Works in Spain became to an industrial practice in the forties because the Government used it as a way of ideological control and popular education through the cinema. Also, it was suitable to the producers, for the reason that the classification of literary adaptation gave them benefits as dubbing licences and the films could be sold for very high prices to the American Distributors. In the fifties this American companies boycotted continually the Spanish producers to separate them from the importation activity. This fact brought about a gradual transformation in the Spanish Industry. Nevertheless the Government continued controlling the content of the films and rewarding the literary adaptations, but the gradual liberation of the relationship between the distribution and the audience affected the practice of adapting.