Numax presenta...

Joaquím Jordà was born in 1935 in Santa Coloma de Farnés, a town in the northeastern province of Girona, Spain. His family was known to be supportive of the Franco regime. At his father’s urging, he studied law and graduated in 1957. Not long after, he moved to Madrid to pursue a future in film, enrolling at the Institute of Cinematographic Research and Experiences (Instituto de Investigaciones y Experiencias Cinematográficas), which would later become the Official School of Cinematography (Escuela Oficial de Cinematografía). Before completing his studies, he returned to Barcelona, where he played a role in founding the Barcelona School of Film (Escuela de Barcelona). He also co-directed his début feature, Dante no es únicamente severo (1967), with Jacinto Esteva—a manifesto film that sought to defy Francoist censorship through formal experimentation. By 1969, worn down by life under the Franco regime, Jordà went into exile in Italy. There, he began making films for the Italian Communist Party’s production company, UNITELE Films. Together with Ivo Barnabó Micheli, he also co-directed Spezziamo le catene (1971), a documentary examining absenteeism and acts of sabotage at Alfa Romeo. He returned to Spain in 1973, earning a living as a translator while continuing to engage in political activism. It wasn’t until the late 1970s, however, that he returned to filmmaking, stepping behind the camera once more to direct Numax presenta... (1980). Convinced that cinema was his true calling, he settled in Madrid in 1983. There, he worked on several television projects and established himself as a regular screenwriter. He returned to directing with El encargo del cazador (1990). In 1995, Jordà joined the academic staff at Pompeu Fabra University, renewing his connection with Barcelona. Tragically, in 1997, he suffered a stroke that left him with agnosia and alexia.

In his final years, Jordà’s work received renewed acclaim, particularly for a series of documentaries including the widely praised Mones com la Becky (1999), De nens (2004) and Veinte años no es nada (2005).  He passed away in Barcelona on 24 June 2006. Following his death, he was posthumously honoured with the National Film Award (Premio Nacional de Cinematografía) and the Special Medal from the Circle of Film Writers (Círculo de Escritores Cinematográficos), in recognition of a career that had already earned him the 2006 National Film Award.

Workers’ Assembly, Numax home appliance company

This is a unique case in which a group of workers with no background in cinema—unfamiliar with its languages, codes and techniques—chose to place themselves at the centre of a film about their own struggle. The Workers’ Assembly of the Numax home appliance company may have lacked filmmaking experience, but they were driven by a clear determination to document their journey. To do so, they turned to Joaquim Jordà, an acquaintance of several workers, and entrusted him with the task of bringing their story to the screen. It stands as a rare example of people directly involved in a conflict choosing to tell their own story, commissioning a filmmaker from outside their ranks, yet shaping the narrative according to their own terms and shared vision.

Numax S.A. was a factory located in the heart of Barcelona, just steps away from the Sagrada Família. At its height, it employed over three hundred people. The company initially specialised in the production of fans, but as economic conditions worsened, it shifted to manufacturing a more limited range of household appliances. In the late 1970s, a labour dispute would mark a decisive turning point in the company’s history. What began as a protest against the dismissal of several employees soon escalated into a prolonged strike and, eventually, the occupation of the plant. It was during this occupation that the workers discovered that the owners had effectively walked away from the business. Though they were not yet the legal proprietors, the workers suddenly found themselves solely responsible for the factory and its day-to-day operations.

The owners—Nazi businessmen who had taken refuge in Barcelona—had quietly begun liquidating the company, selling off assets at knockdown prices and suspending payments. In response, the workers made an extraordinary decision: to organise themselves into an assembly and take direct control of the factory. What followed was an experiment in self-management that would last several years and, at the time, stand as a pioneering example in Spain. As the collective project began to show clear signs of fatigue, the need to preserve a record of the experience became increasingly urgent. With what remained in their resistance fund—around 600,000 pesetas—they chose to make a documentary. They approached Joaquim Jordà, who embraced the project without a script, determined to capture the memory of what had taken place. The result was Numax presenta..., a cinematic testimony that, more than four decades later, still offers a lucid account of the labour, political and personal tensions of the time.

The Numax community was diverse, but united by a strong sense of commitment and activism. Within the workforce, more traditional factions (including veteran employees linked to classic trade unionism) worked alongside younger groups who championed new models of organisation. Women played a particularly prominent role, not only in the daily running of the factory but also in its political life. Differences within the collective were also evident. Some members held to a structured political ideology, while others advocated more radical, socially driven perspectives—questioning even the notion of waged labour, despite being the ones managing the company. One moment captured in an assembly, and later included in the film, speaks poignantly to this sense of disillusionment: “It’s one thing to be exploited by a boss if there’s no alternative, but to do it to yourself... That makes no sense.” Though production levels were maintained with fewer hours of work, getting the goods to market proved far more difficult. Boycotts by other companies, coupled with a lack of resources for advertising, made the entire experiment increasingly hard to sustain.

When the collective came to terms with the inevitability of closure, they chose to shut down the factory, but not without leaving behind a legacy. It was at this point that Jordà became involved, recording conversations with those who had lived through the experience in order to preserve their memories, reflections and emotions. He proposed the idea of making a documentary at a general assembly, where it was approved by majority vote. Despite working with minimal resources—a 16 mm camera, a sound technician and a great deal of determination—the project became a reality.

Joaquím Jordà practised an innovative and revitalising form of documentary filmmaking—coherent, provocative and unafraid to draw on elements of fiction, essay and activist cinema to expose society’s more uncomfortable truths. His approach chose not to hide the underlying mechanisms of filming and representation. As he put it: “a type of filmmaking that believes in truth, not objectivity; open documentary cinema that needs fiction to grow. Because the boundary between fiction and documentary has been broken”.  Jordà’s working method was anything but rigid. Each project was shaped by its specific context, and his filmmaking was deeply grounded in that reality. He rejected the notion of neutrality, embracing instead the idea of cinema as subjective truth-building. He argued that “truth is not incompatible with mise-en-scène” and that “every documentary is a form of fiction”, since it inevitably involves selection, framing, editing and interpretation. This philosophy led him to incorporate, deliberately and explicitly, elements of dramatisation, reconstruction and direct intervention, all without sacrificing rigour.

When it came to the production process, Jordà often began with open-ended structures that took shape gradually during filming. In films such as Numax presenta... (1980) and De nens (2003), the narrative is built progressively through a combination of interviews, observations of real-life situations, the director’s own interventions and the use of fictional devices. This approach enabled Jordà to adapt to the unexpected, welcome moments of chance and cultivate a more natural, dialogic relationship with the people he filmed.

A defining feature of Jordà’s work was involving his cast in the filmmaking process. He didn’t treat them as mere informants or subjects to be observed, but as active participants capable of helping to shape the narrative. This horizontal, collaborative ethos laid the groundwork for forms of participatory cinema in which the boundaries between filmmaker, subject and viewer grew increasingly porous. Jordà was also drawn to the margins, both socially and formally. His documentaries delved into politically sensitive topics such as workers’ self-management, juvenile justice and mental illness, while experimenting with unconventional narrative structures where editing played a key role. Rather than following a linear storyline, he built his films from thematic blocks, tonal contrasts and layered voices drawn from multiple registers. His methodology was ultimately anchored in openness, critical inquiry and a constant rethinking of cinema as a political, ethical and expressive medium.

Numax presenta... was conceived without a conventional script. The only framework was a rough chronological outline pieced together from earlier recordings. The filming structure combined various techniques, from everyday scenes and personal testimonies to occasional reconstructions of real events. Jordà described the process as intense yet filled with unexpected and humorous moments. One such moment came from a simple routine: at the end of each day, he would pin the next day’s shooting schedule to the noticeboard. This small gesture led many of the women workers to arrive the following morning wearing make-up and dressed to impress. At first, Jordà viewed this performativity as disruptive, hindering spontaneity. But over time, he came to understand it as a legitimate form of self-affirmation, a rightful way for them to decide how they wished to be seen on camera.

The shoot lasted barely ten days, constrained by a limited budget. It concluded with an impromptu celebration complete with live music, capturing the uninhibited and irreverent spirit of the 1970s. It was during those final days that the workers made the definitive decision to close the factory and face unemployment. Against this backdrop, Jordà took up his camera and microphone and asked them two questions: “What has this experience meant to you?” and “What do you plan to do now?” Their answers revealed a curious mix of sadness, relief, excitement and uncertainty.

The most theatrical scene in the documentary was filmed at the end. In a single morning at the Institut del Teatre, a group of actors was filmed performing a dramatisation of the employers’ actions: how they had incited the strike in order to justify selling the factory to a property developer; how the workers’ resistance had thwarted these plans; and how this episode fit into the political context of Spain’s democratic transition and the Moncloa Pacts. This sequence, along with the prologue and final scene, was filmed in colour.  The rest of the footage is in black and white.

Editing began shortly afterwards. The workers appointed an oversight committee to attend the evening sessions alongside Jordà and editor Teresa Font. Exhaustion often got the better of them, and they would wind up asleep on the studio carpet. When that wasn’t the case, they contributed by pointing out imbalances in the prominence given to certain colleagues over others, and this feedback was promptly taken on board. However, there was one instance of outright censorship. A satirical final scene had been filmed with Mario Gas’s theatre group—a musical number. It featured three choruses: one of female workers in dark blue overalls, one of office staff in light blue and one of businessmen in trench coats. The number was led by a singer performing “Gavilán o paloma”. The scene ended with the female workers dancing with the businessmen and stripping off their overalls to reveal bikinis underneath. As the song morphed into a samba, the entire group marched symbolically towards Rio de Janeiro—the supposed new home of the re-founded “Numax 2.0”. The editing committee forbade its inclusion: “These women would never dance with a businessman.”