10/06/2015 - Public funding, locations, contacts: you find it all with the new portal launched by the Italian Directorate General for Cinema, the Italian Film Commissions and the Fondazione Ente dello Spettacolo

To help Italian but especially foreign producers who want to make films, fictional series, documentaries, web-series or other audiovisual products in Italy. It was with this aim in mind that the La bussola del cinema (lit. cinema compass) portal, brought online yesterday, was born. The project was thought up by the Italian Directorate General for Cinema of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities and Tourism, in collaboration with the Italian Film Commissions and the Fondazione Ente dello Spettacolo.

"This is a complete guide to the public services and tools of support offered by the Italian State and Regions. It is a project which will be updated on a regular basis, and is open to those who are interested in finding out about new opportunities and production support”, explained Nicola Borrelli, the director general of the Directorate General for Cinema, during the presentation of the project in Rome. For Stefania Ippoliti, the President of the Italian Film Commissions "this is the concrete result of a collective effort, an easily accessible tool that can show the world what Italy has to offer”. 

At the heart of the web platform, available in Italian and English, is a search engine that finds public funds available for production. Each fund is introduced with a data sheet containing useful information for producers, including the contact details of the body with jurisdiction over the fund.

There are also data sheets for the Directorate General for Cinema and the Film Commissions, giving contact details, contact persons and information, together with a short presentation of the body in question including a gallery of carefully chosen places, monuments and landscapes. 

The website also has a ‘Bussola News’ section, with market and industry news, articles from leading Italian and international newspapers, and alerts on funds just published or those for which the deadline is coming up or has just passed. 

The 'Gallery' section will contain a selection of video clips and photos of places where successful films have been shot and the sets of films currently under production, as well as trailers, backstage photos and more.

A database of locations is also being developed, which will feature another search engine just for finding landscapes, monuments and natural scenery belonging to Italian cultural heritage.

(Translated from Italian)