Films in languages other than English now reach large audiences outside their home markets routinely rather than exceptionally. Several distribution changes converged to make that possible.
Physical distribution used to be the filter
Releasing a foreign-language film theatrically required a local distributor to acquire rights, produce prints, book screens and fund a marketing campaign.
Each of those steps carried fixed costs that had to be justified by expected returns, and the expected returns for subtitled releases were modest.
Only films with festival recognition or an established director cleared that bar, which is why exposure was narrow and concentrated in a few cities.
Streaming removed the marginal cost of carrying a title
Adding a film to a catalogue costs almost nothing once the rights are held, and it does not displace anything else the way a screen booking does.
A platform can therefore carry titles that would never have justified a theatrical release, since the decision is about licensing rather than about screens.
The economics changed from needing a film to succeed in a market to needing it to be worth the licence fee across all markets combined.
Recommendation systems do not weigh language heavily
Platforms surface titles based on what similar viewers watched and finished, and language is one attribute among many rather than a gate.
A viewer who watches a particular kind of thriller is offered more of them, and the system does not treat a subtitle track as disqualifying.
This exposes audiences to titles they would never have sought out, which is the step that broke the assumption that subtitles limit reach.
Localisation became cheaper and faster
Subtitling and dubbing were once commissioned per territory as separate deals, each with its own cost and lead time.
Centralised localisation pipelines now produce many language versions from a single source, which lowers the per-territory cost substantially.
Because a title arrives localised for many markets simultaneously, a film can build international attention at once rather than country by country over years.
Viewing habits adapted alongside
Subtitles were already widely used by viewers watching in noisy environments or preferring them for clarity, well before any question of foreign language arose.
Once reading a screen became ordinary, the practical barrier to a subtitled film largely disappeared for a substantial share of the audience.
The remaining resistance is generational and narrowing, which is why non-English titles now appear in general recommendation lists rather than in a separate section.