If you download ‘Torrente Presidente’, Santiago Segura has the same message for you as if you downloaded ‘Torrente 3’

Whoever tries to download ‘Torrente, president‘ Through unofficial channels you will find, instead of the film, a video message from Santiago Segura asking you to go to the cinema. It is not the first time: the Madrid director has been using this same tactic and this same video since 2005, with ‘Torrente 3’.

Torrente deceives you. The sixth installment of the highest-grossing saga of Spanish cinema has been in theaters for eleven days and already accumulates more than 16 million euros in collection. It is the most viewed film in Spain so far this year, and yet, whoever downloads the film via torrent will find a clip in which Santiago Segura asks the viewerwith his usual casual tone, to go to the movies.

The video is titled ‘Torrente, president… or not?’ It weighs only 22 MB and lasts one and a half minutes. It’s impossible to confuse it with a full movie, but the file name does its job perfectly: appearing in search results where a user would expect to find the actual movie.

It’s not the first time. The video has not been filmed now: already in 2005, with the release of ‘Torrente 3: El Protector’, Santiago Segura distributed this same video, playing the first minutes of the film before cutting to the warning message. These were the times of widespread unauthorized downloads and the popularization of what was then known as Top Manta, and Segura was not the only one undertaking this type of initiative.

For example, around the same time, the copy seen on the internet of the French film ‘Blueberry’ started normally until, after ten minutes, the protagonist broke the fourth wall and addressed the viewer. The group Estopa did something similar with one of their albums, adding voice interruptions to some copies that were circulating on the internet.

Unique strategies. This video adds to the fame of Santiago Segura as one of the filmmakers who best knows how to attract the public’s attention, even if it is with messages that apparently stand in favor of the industry and against the user who is not aware of torrents. The promotional strategy for ‘Torrente Presidente’ has been equally unusual: no prior press screenings, no official trailer until the Monday after the premiere, with no advances of any kind regarding cameos or plot. This contributed to the public rushing to see it en masse from day one, before the social conversation gutted the content. This message about unauthorized torrents obeys the same logic: control of content until the box office has been squeezed.

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