ARP Co-Chairs, Dante Desarthe and Eric Lartigau
Dear Frédérique Bredin, President of the CNC
Dear Jacques Audiard,
Dear friends,
I regret, believe me, that I cannot be with you today for the 25th anniversary of the IDA meetings.
I am indeed in Greece with the President of the Republic to bring the voice of French culture and help Greek culture to make its voice heard. Our two countries have very close cultural ties. These ties, which are those of European unity and solidarity, are manifested in particular through the fund set up by the CNC to support Greek cinema during the crisis.
It is an action in the image of what France, with the ARP and the world of cinema as a whole, and what these encounters embody: the vision of an open, plural cinema, which allows all authors, wherever they come from in Europe or the rest of the world, to express their vision of the world through their work. Some would have us believe that to defend French cinema is to ignore the realities of open borders, to ignore the desires of the public, to hide behind imaginary walls. The opposite is true.
Together, we defend cultural diversity, that is, the profound affirmation of the right of peoples to live their difference, to come out of the isolation of standardization by discovering otherness. And I am very proud that France, and the solidarity of the world of cinema that founded the policy of support, allow Yorgos Lanthimos to direct The Lobster, or Miguel Gomes to direct The Thousand and One Nights.
We are fortunate to have in France a cinema admired worldwide for its creativity, dynamism and success. It is the fruit of a proactive policy of the public authorities supported by the constant commitment of the world of cinema, a commitment of which these Meetings are a testimony.
Together, we have been able to build and implement a policy that promotes diversity and the renewal of creation, business investment, the development of world-class know-how, and finally, the cinematic public.
It is a rare, rare and fragile alchemy in the face of what I call the “netflix-isation” of practices. It poses two challenges:
The challenge of funding, first of all, because these new players in the film and audiovisual industries are not located in France. We have taken initial steps by extending the levy to these operators wherever they are located, but we must go further.
The challenge of the audience, then, and especially of the young audience: faced with the power of the algorithm, we must do everything so that everyone continues to go to the cinema, continues to see the films, continues to have this curiosity, this taste for the unexpected through which a film-loving culture is formed. That is why I have made arts and cultural education one of the priorities of my ministry, especially through the school and film programs that we celebrated 20 years ago.
All these challenges call for our constant mobilization. They also call for concrete answers – this is the path I have chosen since my arrival at the Ministry of Culture.
The first response to these challenges is support for creation:
Supporting creation means fighting piracy, which threatens creation, and defending copyright without which there is no cultural diversity.
Supporting creation also means supporting its renewal: we have exceptional schools. Alongside the Fémis, which brings out so many new talents, other film schools are now being created, and I am pleased about that. I am thinking in particular of Claude Lelouch’s project in Beaune as well as the Cinéfabrique, chaired by Abderrahmane Sissako, who has just opened in Lyon, with the support of my ministry. The renewal of creation requires a greater openness to the diversity of backgrounds, which nourishes the diversity of viewpoints. That is my conviction.
This diversity of creation is also made possible by the diversity of investments in cinema.
That is why I defend the principle of a strong commitment by television channels to independent cinema. The strength of French cinema lies in the variety of its writings, the plurality of points of view and the experiences it offers: The Ram Family to Dheepan, of L'Hermine at Fatima of Philippe Faucon.
We can therefore welcome the agreements concluded last May with Canal +, whose regulatory transcription has just been approved by the Conseil d'état. The decree is already being published.
As for France Télévisions, it will continue to be committed to the diversity of cinema. I have placed it at the heart of the priorities of the new presidency of France Télévisions, and the draft budget being discussed at the National Assembly will give it the means to this ambition: France Télévisions will have more solid funding, more independent, and even strengthened with the adoption by MEPs of a further increase in its allocation of €25 million. An increase that the public broadcaster had not experienced in a very long time.
Defending French creation also means ensuring that production is located in France.
That is why, as soon as I arrived on Rue de Valois, I wanted to strengthen our tax credit systems. With the support of parliamentarians, we are getting there. The 2016 draft budget contains historic measures in favour of cinema, including a 30% increase in the applicable rate for all French-language films. This reformed tax credit is a major gesture of the Government and the majority in favour of cinema.
I would also like the CNC’s support mechanisms to take greater account of the location of shootings. This is the purpose of the mission entrusted to Alain Sussfeld to reform accreditation. I await its conclusions in December. We will then have a very large arsenal to anchor the entire creative sector in France.
The second response we need to make to netflix-isation is better dissemination of cinema.
First in the room: discussions took place between operators and distributors, under the aegis of the CNC. The first conclusions will be reflected in the creative freedom act that I am defending in Parliament.
Then on video on demand: In the world of the abundance of cultural proposals, cinema must be present where the public is, and especially young people.
That is why, during the first reading of the bill on creative freedom, parliamentarians and I set out the principle of “seeking a continued exploitation” of audiovisual work “in keeping with the practices of the profession”.
This proposal reconciles two fundamental objectives of the policy of support for cinema and audiovisual: on the one hand, the growing need to develop the presence of works online; on the other hand, the need to preserve the pre-financing conditions for these works, because it is one of the pillars of the diversity of creation.
A professional agreement will clarify and frame this obligation to take into account the nature of the works concerned and the specificities of the different modes of exploitation. I therefore call on all interested professionals to start discussions now.
Improving the availability of works by preserving their pre-financing is also the purpose of the discussions you conducted on the media timeline: I believe that we are now close to an agreement that goes in the right direction. Concrete and readable progress is needed in favour of the dissemination of works.
In this more open world, where technological developments are sometimes difficult to grasp, it is true that we must fight against the temptation of withdrawal, against the temptation of a return to moral order and against uniformity.
That is why I wanted the freedom of creation to be enshrined in law – against all those who want to impose censorship in the name of their convictions, morals or politics. Because this temptation is unacceptable. If art does not bother us, then what do we expect from it? I am proud that the Creative Freedom Act was passed by a very large majority – a great victory for culture and democracy.
There is, of course, a legitimate principle of child protection that I am extremely committed to, a principle of transparency and legitimate public information about what they are about to see. That’s the whole meaning of classification. It is therefore important that the visa, which I am responsible for issuing, be based on the opinion of a committee of professionals representing all sensitivities.
Today, the texts provide for an automatic prohibition for under-18s, which does not allow to take into account the impact of works on the public. I therefore asked Jean-François Mary to work, in consultation, on proposals that allow everyone to act taking into account the specificities of each work. This issue, I know, will be debated tomorrow, and I will be very attentive to what comes out of it.
My dear friends, if you and I fight so much for a diversified and independent cinema, it is because we are convinced that cinema can do a lot and that it gives a lot. It allows us to see the world through the eyes of another, to think and feel, putting ourselves in the place of others, for the better – the part of the dream – and for the worse – fear, suffering, despair. The cinema allows us to be for a few minutes a refugee fleeing war, a free girl refusing choking and forced marriage, a man confronted with the violence of unemployment, a teenager saved by love. The strength of cinema is to get out of the tranquility of our certainties to understand the other. That’s why we fight. As Costa-Gavras said, when Z was crowned in Cannes, “you can’t change people’s political views with a film, but you can at least generate a political discussion.”
We have never needed art and cinema so much. I wish you a very nice meeting of the ARP, and an excellent anniversary.