The British Film Institute (BFI) and the National Cinema Center (CNC) signed an image cooperation agreement in motion aimed at promoting a more in-depth collaboration between the film industries of the United Kingdom and French.
The agreement comes during the French president Macron Symbolic Trip in London during a first state visit for all European leader in the United Kingdom from Brexit.
Despite close cultural and commercial links between the two countries, cooperation between the two has not always been simple due to various financing and legislation systems.
Brexit, which saw the United Kingdom leave the European Union and creative Europe accordingly, also made collaboration more difficult.
Today’s agreement was signed by the director general of BFI, Ben Roberts, and the president of CNC, Gaëtan Bruel, in the presence of the French Minister of Culture Rachida Dati and the British Minister of Creative Industries, Arts and Tourism Chris Bryant.
It remains to see to what extent the memorandum of understanding (MOU) will bear fruit, but in principle, it will allow the BFI and the CNC, both founding members of EFAD (European Film Agency Directors Association), to establish a policy of strategic cooperation to improve cultural diversity, expand the public and strengthen their respective industries.
The areas of joint activity will include public policies to support the film, audiovisual and mobile images sector; Education, emphasizing the supply of the culture of images in motion to young audiences; Heritage, including restoration, preservation and collaboration on specific projects and events to facilitate more important commercial and professional relations between British and French companies by emphasizing co -production, but without limiting itself,
The agreement also aims to encourage the sharing of mutual knowledge between BFI and CNC through a program to exchange employees and audience development and support measures for cinemas, festivals and online national platforms with an emphasis on the encouragement of the British public for French films and vice versa
“France and the United Kingdom are two major cinema nations, with strong institutions that have a global vision of cinema and a desire to support independent creativity,” said the Minister of French Culture Dati.
“Today, this question is directly linked to cultural sovereignty. I am convinced that we can work with the United Kingdom to develop fruitful exchanges in support of independent creativity. ”
Ben Roberts, CEO of the BFI, echoed the words of Dati, describing the United Kingdom and France as “two of the most dynamic cinema nations in Europe”.
“We have a long history of collaboration, including by co-production and distribution and exhibition of the films of the other on all platforms,” he said.
“Co -production is one of the most significant ways of means to continue this shared exchange – and this initiative to strengthen knowledge and collaboration has been built in this spirit. In the United Kingdom, we have created the conditions to promote this through the British Global Screen Fund and carefully designed audio-visual expenditure credits, including the new 40%independent cinematographic tax credit, “he added.
Their memorandum of memorandum of understanding follows in the wake of the partnership agreements already in place between the British Film Commission and Spain, Italy, Austria, Norway, Malta and the Netherlands. Recent film and HETV productions that have filmed or did their VFX work in the two territories include: The amateur,, Targett, Heads of state,, Young lady,, The Lord of the Rings,, Rings of season 2.
